Return and Attack
by Nightblade888
Summary: After three years Naruto returns to Konoha. However, forces make his return home one of danger and and intregue. Through all of the twists, love blooms, and revelations made. [I don't own Naruto or any of its characters] R&R [NaruHina]
1. Chapter 1

It was a calm autumn night in Konohagakure, the village hidden in the leaves; this however, was simply the calm before the storm. Rain clouds began to form in the sky as two figures meandered towards the ninja village. When the guards spotted the two, they immediately tensed up. They had good reason, the only groups that they knew of that traveled in two, were the Akatsuki, and Jiraiya and Uzumaki Naruto. Neither group were particularly welcome in the village.

It had been a long three years for Uzumaki Naruto, the intense training he had received from the frog hermit was easily the most taxing activity he had ever done. Upon seeing the walls of the village for the first time in three years, the blonde wanted only one thing.

"Ramen!" The fifteen year old boy yelled at the top of his lungs.

Even though the distance between Naruto and the wall guards was large, the sound of the boy's voice carried quite easily. Upon hearing the call the guards had different reactions regarding the loud mouthed ninja's exclamation. About half of the guards were relieved to find out that they wouldn't have to face off against the S-class criminals. Those who shared in this belief were of the younger demographic. The older guards were less than happy. After three years of relative peace, the Kyuubi brat was returning.

Unfortunately for Naruto, Jiraiya had other plans.

"Sorry kid, but we've got to check in with Tsunade." The hermit reminded his apprentice.

"Yeah, yeah" replied Naruto, dejectedly.

Upon reaching the gates, they were ordered to go directly to the Godaime Hokage's office. The sun had finished setting as they headed directly for Tsunade's office.

"Don't you think it's kinda late to be working?" Questioned Naruto.

"For most people, yes" replied Jiraiya. "But considering it is Tsunade, she's probably asleep on top of her paper work again."

At the thought of the Hokage, sleeping on mission reports and assignments for the next day, both master and student couldn't help but laugh.

"Hey kid" the old hermit said, in between howls of laughter, "I'll make a bet with you. If I win then you've got to promise not to tell Tsunade about that little mishap back in Suna."

Naruto was forced to quit laughing to ponder this proposal. "Hmm, now which mishap would that be?" He asked quizzically. "Would that be the one where you took all my money for 'research', and ended up spending it on sake and women? Or how about the one where you had me practicing taijutsu, and I hit the log so hard that after it hit the back of your head, it sent you sailing into the women's section of the local bath house? Or how about the time, when you had me practice Goukakyuu no Jutsu, and you insisted that I was doing it wrong and ended up burning half of the camp site, and some of the town?"

"Heh, heh…" Jiraiya sweat dropped, remembering all the different occasions that had gotten them almost removed from Sunagakure. "Ok, let's make this interesting, If I win, you can't mention any of those incidents. If you win, I'll teach you Togeyomi."

"Ok, sounds reasonable" responded Naruto. "What are we betting on?"

"The bet is that when we enter Tsunade's office, she's asleep and when she wakes up she'll have paper work stuck to her face!" Replied Jiraiya.

At the thought of this, the two characters were once again sent into fits of laughter and had to calm them selves down for five minutes before they could continue. As they wound themselves along the staircase leading to the Hokage's office, they had to stifle another round of laughing. When they entered the building, the office was pretty empty. Everyone was gone except for Shizune, Tsunade's traveling companion/day planner. At first Shizune didn't seem to notice the two when they entered the room. When she looked up, she saw Jiraiya with whom she could only assume to be Naruto. Although, you'd never have been able to tell that the adolescent man before her was at once a short loud-mouthed Gennin. Naruto had grown a lot in the past three years. Not just physically, but he'd also picked up a semblance of what could almost be construed as manners. Instead of the bright orange jump suit he used to wear, Naruto now wore black pants with a black shirt, with orange stripes around the shoulders. His forehead protector was tied around his forehead just as it had been three years ago.

"Hey Shizune-nee-chan, is Tsunade-obaa-chan in?" Questioned the blonde ninja.

Both Shizune and Jiraiya sweat dropped upon hearing Naruto refer to the Godaime Hokage as obaa-chan.

"Yes she is, but I'm going to warn you now, if she hears you call her that, you'll wish that you hadn't come back." Shizune warned.

She led the two into a room to find Tsunade…actually doing paper work.

"Hah! I win" bellowed Naruto when he saw what could only be described as a miracle.

Tsunade looked up from her work to see her old team mate Jiraiya standing with a taller, more mature looking Naruto.

"Win what?" questioned the Hokage with an air of curiosity in her voice.

"The bet I made with Ero-sennin. If I won he has to teach me Togeyomi, if I lost, I couldn't tell you about all the stuff that Ero-sennin did during my training." Naruto replied.

"Oh, and what kind of stuff did he do?" Asked Tsunade with a malicious tone to her voice as she eyed Jiraiya intent on finding out what stupid thing he had done.

"Well, for starters there was the tmmm." Naruto was cut off by Jiraiya forcibly restraining the blonde from finishing the sentence.

"Oh, he means all the times that he wanted to learn some insanely dangerous jutsu and I wouldn't let him!" Exclaimed Jiraiya hoping that he might be able to avoid the wrath of the Godaime.

Tsunade glared at him knowing full well that his previous statement was a lie, but she decided to let it pass, just this once.

"Jiraiya, that's a lie and everyone in this room, knows it. But I'm feeling lenient right now, seeing as I just finished all the paper work for tonight. I'll make a deal with you. I'll forget that you even tried to lie to the Hokage so long as you don't attempt to do any of your 'research' while you are here." At that point, Tsunade grabbed a hold of the frog hermit and pulled him closer to her. "But if I hear even one scream of 'Pervert' then I'll make sure that you'll never be able to go near another bath house for a very long time." She finished glaring into her former team-mate's eyes with an intensity that would cripple most shinobi and cause pandemonium amongst the civilian population for a week.

With the thought of banishment from bath houses looming over him Jiraiya was only able to mutter a "Hai" before proceeding to chastise Naruto about proper etiquette around his superiors.

"Jiraiya, quit abusing your student and just give me your report so I can go get a drink and end this day properly." Said Tsunade rubbing her temples in annoyance.

"All right" grumbled the older man. "Uzumaki Naruto was placed under my care for the purposes of training for the past three years. During that time, he was instructed in chakra control, taijutsu, and ninjutsu. The purpose of the training was to allow Naruto to access and control large amounts of Kyuubi's chakra without loosing control. He has proved himself to be highly proficient at ninjutsu and slightly above proficient at taijutsu. I wouldn't hesitate to say that he is at least a high chunnin level ninja at this point, if not jounin level." As Jiraiya is finishing his report the noise of someone running in the hallways entered the room, only slightly before Hyuuga Hiashi did.

Upon entering the room, the head of the Hyuuga clan did something very out of character given the resolute and stoic behavior he was known for. He collapsed onto the floor. In the blink of an eye Tsunade was hovering over the man analyzing his condition.

"It's just fatigue; sit him on the chair in the corner, hurry." Tsunade ordered. "Hyuuga-sama, what is so urgent that you ran over here your self to tell me?" Asked the Hokage.

"My…daughter…has… been… abducted." He managed to say in-between gasps of air.

"What happened?" Questioned Tsunade, as she motioned for the ANBU outside of her office to begin to search the surrounding area for the child.

"I was in the study attending to clan business, when I heard a commotion out side. I ran to investigate, and found carnage. Around 15 of the Hyuuga guards were dead or injured. I heard the sounds of a fight coming from around the corner, and so I ran towards it. I saw one man taking on three of the guards as another exited my daughter Hinata's room. I saw that she appeared to be unconscious and slung over the intruder's back. When the man's partner saw him with Hinata, they both exited the compound and vanished. I've already sent out some patrols, but I haven't heard any news yet." Hiashi was calming down as he spoke, but much of his information was delivered between gasps for air and he seemed to be quit upset.

"Did you get any kind of look at the assailants, were they cloud nin again?" Tsunade asked.

"No, they weren't cloud ninjas, but I did see them." Hiashi responded.

"What did they look like, if you don't tell me than I can't determine the best way to get your daughter back." Exclaimed Tsunade.

"They fit the description of Hoshigake Kisame, and Uchiha Itachi perfectly." Hiashi said, calming himself down a bit.

Before the words were out of his mouth, the sound of a door slamming shut and running was heard. Before Tsunade could turn around to yell at Shizune to get more ANBU into the forest to cut of any escape routes, Uzumaki Naruto was running straight into the forest, in an attempt to stop the two missing nins.

Anger washed over Naruto as he sped towards the forest surrounding Konoha. He was beyond angry, and mad. He had exceeded the level of pissed off. He was in a state of pure uncontrollable rage. It was bad enough that Akatsuki was after the Kyuubi no Kitsune that was sealed inside of him by the Yondaime Hokage, but now they were taking his friends just to get to him. Well, it was working. If Akatsuki wanted the Kyuubi, then they were going to get it. The Kyuubi's chakra started to envelope Naruto as he ran into the forest. His eyes turned from shimmering blue to glaring red. His finger nails elongated into sharp claws. His face began to darken, and the three whisker marks on his cheeks became more pronounced. The last part of the transformation was the formation of three chakra tails behind him. With his new changes, Naruto began to search for the traitors not by visual clues, but by scent. Part of the transformation had heightened his sense of smell beyond that of an ordinary human and into that of a fox.

He sniffed around a little bit before catching the scent of blood. He ran undeterred through the trees at speeds that only Lee and Gai would be able to match. Along with the eyes and claws, Kyuubi had heightened Naruto's speed so that he would be able to catch up with the two missing criminals and Hinata.

It had begun to rain as Itachi and Kisame made their escape from Konoha. The felt the explosion of Kyuubi's chakra far behind them and continued on their way. Gradually, the enormous chakra signature that was Naruto began to catch up to the two Akatsuki members.

"Damn it!" Swore Kisame. "He's gaining too much ground. We can't make it back."

"Agreed" replied his partner. "Since he would have an advantage in the trees against you, we should head over this way. There is a clearing. That should take away any advantage he may have over you." Itachi was very calculating. In his mind, he doubted that the location of their inevitable battle would matter at all. Naruto was just a gennin, and Kisame was one of the Hidden Village of the Mist's legendary seven swordsmen. However, given the fact that the boy had eluded the organizations grasp for the past few years, Itachi wasn't going to risk the opportunity to capture the nine-tailed demon.

They had made it to the clearing and turned towards the direction of the chakra they felt, and they waited. Less than five minutes after they had stopped, the signature turned towards the two ninja and their captive. Less than two minutes after that Naruto arrived at the clearing.

Standing on the limb of a tree Naruto took stock of the situation. Itachi and Kisame were standing in front of him, with Hinata lying on the ground between them. Naruto was lucky. The moon gave enough light to identify her, by her purple hair. It was longer than he had remembered, it now reached to her shoulders. The jacket which she wore was still present, and it seems that she had just returned from training. Bruises and scrapes gave testimony to the work she was doing before her capture.

'If I stay in the trees I can only use long range attacks, but I might hit Hinata.' Thought Naruto. So he did the only thing he could. He dropped to the ground and approached the two ninjas.

"Ah, Uzumaki Naruto, vessel of the kyuubi no kitsune, to what do we owe the honor?" Kisame chided.

"What did you bastards do to her?" demanded Naruto through clenched teeth..

"Nothing too severe just caught her in a handy genjustu." Replied Kisame. I only wish I had the Mangekyou Sharingan like Itachi so I could have had the opportunity to torture her a bit but my method works just as well." Smirked Kisame.

Suddenly, the chakra coming from Naruto's body became more intense than before, and almost as suddenly, Kisame didn't have a head. If Itachi didn't have his sharingan active, he wouldn't have been able to see what happened. Even though he did, he could only see the technique that Naruto used, not his body, just the red ball of chakra that had been forced into Kisame's head and caused it to explode like a balloon. Actually, Itachi didn't even see that much, all he saw was a red flash, and a deep cry of "RASENGAN" from the blonde ninja.

Once Kisame died, Hinata was released from the genjutsu she was trapped in. Looking around she saw the headless body of a tall, blue skinned man on her right, and a boy with blonde hair behind him, a crimson chakra surrounding him.

'It looks so much like him' she thought 'but what is that weird chakra around him?'

Naruto turned around towards Itachi and Hinata. Itachi was in shock from what he'd just seen. Hinata looked up to see the face of her savior; his eyes were no longer the deep blue that she remembered but a fierce red that rivaled that of the sharingan.

"Th...That technique…" stammered Itachi "It isn't supposed to be around any more. You can't possibly know that. No one can, it can't be copied, it's too fast!"

"You're right" came Naruto's reply. Only his voice was deeper, and laced with malice. "No one can copy that technique with a sharingan. It also shouldn't exist any more. But I did copy it. So it does exist.

"How?" came Itachi's stuttered reply

"Easy, it was the only move the Yondaime showed me when we fought. I'd have to be some kind of idiot demon not to be able to figure it out in 15 years of imprisonment." Came the reply.

"Kyuubi!" was all that Itachi could mutter as his eyes began to form the feared Mangekyou sharingan.

"Wh… what is he talking about N…Naruto-kun?" Hinata turned to ask. But when she turned around the boy was no longer there, and the sounds of battle rang out from behind her. She spun around to see Naruto behind Itachi, who had staggered to the right of where he was a second ago. A rasengan shaped hole now appeared on his side. The Mangekyou had saved his life. It had allowed him to see the ball of whirling chakra that was speeding at him, but not enough to dodge the blow completely. Immediately Itachi tried to flee, but Naruto flashed in front of him and greeted him with a punch to the face. Itachi back flipped away in mid air after receiving the blow. He then put his chakra reserves towards staunching the wound on his left side. He only had enough chakra for one attack, and even then it wouldn't be enough to kill the enraged boy.

So he used a move that he had copied off another Akatsuki member. He began to gather all his energy in towards the center of is body. Naruto didn't know what was happening, and ran towards the older brother of his rival in an attempt to kill him. He didn't have enough energy, even with Kyuubi's help to maintain the shunshin. That is how he had caused the death of one of the most dangerous ninja around and mortally wounded another one. As he ran towards Hinata he felt the chakra in Itachi reach a threshold. It was then he knew what was going on. Itachi was trying to take both of them out with him. He was turning his body into a bomb.

Naruto stopped in front of Hinata just as he felt the chakra in Itachi's body shatter every tenketsu in his body, killing the missing nin, and creating an explosion that was meant to kill both teenagers. Kyuubi receded into Naruto's subconscious at that exact moment, he was tired from using shunshin too much and for creating the changes that naruto had used to track the missing nins. As Naruto took control over his body, he realized what was happening, and closed his eyes in an instinctive reflex. It wouldn't save his life though. He heard the explosion; he felt the shock wave after it was over. But he didn't feel pain. He didn't feel anything. He opened his eyes to see two white sheets in front of him. He was obviously dead, if he was seeing white sheets. Wasn't he? He looked around him, the sheets were enveloping him. But when he looked directly behind him, the sheets seemed to grow thinner, until they disappeared into Hinata's back.

"Hinata?" He asked quietly.

The girl raised her head to see the boy who had saved her life standing over her; the back ground was entirely white. Slowly the sheets began to separate and he could see that they weren't sheets, but enormous wings.

The last thing he remembered before passed out due to exhaustion was his voice

"Are you an Angel?" He asked before darkness and sleep overtook him.

Hinata attempted to stand and run towards the boy, but the effects of the Genjutsu had robbed her of much of her chakra and no sooner had she made it to Naurto's side, than she too passed out.

Naruto awoke to the sound of yelling. He looked around and realized that he was in the hospital. On his left, Hinata was sitting up looking over at him.

When she saw him move, a wave of relief washed over her body. When Naruto saw that Hinata was unharmed, he felt the same wave of relief.

"It's my fault you're in here, I'm so sorry." They both said at the same time.

Needless to say, this left both teens very confused.

They were both going to say something when Tsunade came rushing into the room.

"ARE YOU INSANE?" She yelled at Naruto. "YOU WALKED RIGHT INTO THE PEOPLE WHO WANT YOU DEAD!"

"Ts…Tsu…Tsunade-sama, i it's my fault that Naruto-kun is here.

"Obaa-chan, it's my fault that Hinata was taken and why she's in here now." The blonde said.

Tsunade looked just as confused as the two teens.

'How is that possible?' she thought. "Why don't you tell me what happened at least. We have no idea what happened after you ran off Naruto, and the circumstances around your abduction are hazy as well Hinata." Replied the Hokage.

"I…I'll g go first" stuttered Hinata. She took a big breath and began

"I I was g getting ready for bed w when I h heard a s shout f from o out side. W When I w went to look I I was s stopped by a big b blue man. H He put me under s some k kind of g g genjutsu. Th th the next th thing that I r remember was Naruto-kun standing b behind me and th the blue man didn't have a head." She recounted.

"When I left, I ran towards the Hyuuga compound and out into the forest." Began Naruto. "I started to track the smell of blood for a while, until I came into a clearing. Kisame was standing with Itachi and Hinata was lying on the ground between the two of them. I dropped out of the trees and tried to figure out why they wanted Hinata to begin with. Then Kisame said some things, and I kinda let 'him' take control." His voice tailed off when he said the last sentence. Tsunade's eyes widened in shock.

"YOU DID WHAT?" She screamed.

"I could still take control if I needed to, but it all worked out. So the first thing that happens is he creates a rasengan and then uses some special technique called 'shunshin' to go really fast, and he forced the rasengan into Kisame's head. Then he used shunshin again and was able to wound Itachi with another rasengan to his side. Then he punched him. Then Itachi did something weird, he started to gather all the energy her could and turned himself into a bomb." Naruto finished.

"How did you survive?" Asked Tsunade

"I…I don't know" Naruto said. "I took control back and closed my eyes and waited to die. But instead, something big and white blocked the explosion and when I looked around it looked like sheets were hanging around me, but instead they were wings and they came from …from Hinata's back." He said.

At this point all three of them were puzzled. Tsunade wondered what the hell happened with wings coming from Hinata's back and why the Akatsuki was after her, Hinata wondered why Naruto talked like he had some kind of split personality, and Naruto was wondering about what would happen in the aftermath of all of this.

Suddenly a thought crept into the Godaime Hokage's head. It was a long shot, but she wondered none the less.

"Hinata" she began "can I see your back?"

"W…What for H Hokage-sama"

"I think I may be able to figure out what lead to all of this."

She stepped over to Hinata's bed, as Hinata was removing the jacket that she always wore. It had to large holes in it, from where the 'wings' had come out. When she did, Tsunade saw what she had hoped not to find. All along Hinata's back and arms were intricate black loops and designs, it was a seal. When Naruto saw the lines, he didn't know what exactly was going on.

"Naruto" the Hokage said "I need to see your seal."

"Why it's not like its broken or anything?" He asked.

"Because," Tsunade said with the hint of a threat in her voice "I said so, so humor me and let me check it."

Seeing the writing on the wall, Naruto pulled up his shirt and molded some chakra so that the seal was visible. Hinata let out a gasp as she saw it.

"S…So what that man said a about Kyuubi…the K Kyuubi is sealed i inside of y you?" Hinata asked tentatively.

Naruto looked at Tsunade who simply nodded her head.

"Yes." He said, slowly and softly, still not wanting to say it. "I'm sorry I caused you all this trouble Hinata-chan, as soon as I can I'll leave and that way you'll be safe. Those men only came after you to get to me. They want the Kyuubi that's sealed inside of me."

"N-no Naruto-kun, I I don't think that you understand, I-I have a demon sealed inside me too. The nibi no aosagi, the two tailed swan. Those were the wings you saw. I used her wings to protect you." Hinata said, finishing without a stutter. "My father always that the vessel for the nibi would be strong, that is why he calls me weak. He doesn't see me, as his daughter, just the container for some demon." She said dejectedly.

"I'm sorry to hear that Hinata-chan. I know how you feel. I always get icy glares from people in the street and people that don't see me as the container, just as the Kyuubi."

Upon hearing him call her 'Hinata-chan' Hinata began to blush.

"Are you ok, Hinata-chan?" Naruto asked.

"Hai…it's just I'm not used to calling me 'Hinata-chan'"

"I'm sure you'll get used to it after a while." He said scratching the back of his head and grinning.

"Well, you both seem to be recovering fine; you'll just have to stay here for observation for a couple of days. I'll be back to check on you two in a few hours." With that Tsunade left.

"A-ano, um Naruto-kun, now that I know about Kyuubi, it makes sense. You always seem so happy and energetic just like a fox. It suits you well." Hinata said as she blushed.

"Thanks Hinata-chan. I think you're a lot like a swan actually. You're kinda quiet, but you're really smart, and you're very graceful." Naruto barely managed to get out the last part before his voice disappeared and a bright red blush overtook his face.

"Thank you Naruto-kin" Hinata replied.

"Hey Hinata-chan, when we get out of here, would you like to go get some ramen with me?" Naruto asked rather sheepishly

"Sure" She responded while blushing even deeper.


	2. Chapter 2

Sunlight streamed into the hospital room currently occupied by Uzumaki Naruto and Hyuuga Hinata. Both teenagers were asleep, having been drained of their chakra during their ordeal the night before. Hinata was the first to awaken when sunlight began to dance around her face. Looking over at the boy laying asleep to her right, she couldn't help but smile. 'He looks peaceful when he's asleep' she thought.

Peaceful might have described Naruto at the moment, but it certainly didn't pertain to the Godaime Hokage. Tsunade was in a meeting with Hyuuga Hiashi, Hinata's father. She wasn't happy with the answers she was receiving from the head of the Hyuuga clan. Jiraiya stood to her left, eyes closed and the beginnings of a frown crossing his face.

"With all due respect, Hokage-sama, you do not have the authority to interfere in clan matters." Hiashi stated with his usual authoritative voice.

"Failing to notify me that you had sealed a demon inside of your own daughter, who is an active ninja doesn't sound like a 'clan matter' to me!" The Godaime retorted, starting to sound annoyed.

Hiashi could hear the truth in what the Hokage was saying, but he couldn't care less right now, as always he was worried about the safety of the clan above all else. Last night he had shown worry when he stormed into the office of the Hokage, but it was fear that the Hyuuga would loose a very powerful weapon, not fear of loosing is daughter.

"Fine, then she will be removed from the list of active ninja from now on. She is too weak to be of any real use to her team anyways." He coldly stated.

At this both sannin were overcome with anger. As the head of the Hyuuga clan was about to exit, Tsunade snapped out of her present haze and simply said:

"So what she said was true."

Hiashi slowly turned around and looked at the blonde Hokage. White eyes met brown as the two stared at each other.

"Hinata said that you only saw her as the vessel for the nibi, not as your own daughter, and that you were constantly calling her weak. Now I can see that she was telling a very painful truth." The Godaime finished.

"Hn, she is weak. After seeing that boy's fight against my nephew in the chunnin exam, it proved exactly how weak she is. He was able to call on the Kyuubi's chakra to help him. Hinata has never show any kind abilities or been able to access the chakra of the nibi." Hiashi spat.

Before either Hiashi or Tsunade could move, Jiraiya had grabbed the clan leader's robes and lifted him into the air.

"That is what this is about? She can't use the nibi's chakra, and so you call her worthless and weak!" Jiraiya spat at Hiashi. "You don't know anything! Do you? You think that just because she has some demon sealed inside of her, that she should be able to use its chakra. You obviously don't know anything about seals then. I'm willing to bet that your precious council of elders did the sealing for you, assuring you that she would be as strong as Naruto! They lied to you, Hiashi. They fucking lied to you, and you bought it hook, line and sinker! Tsunade described the seal for me. It doesn't allow for chakra to pass through. Your council was trying to save her from all influences of the demon, and so it completely sealed off the nibi's chakra. That's why she can't use it. When she did use it last night to save both her and Naruto's life, it almost killed her!" Jiraiya was yelling at this point, hoping that maybe Hiashi would listen for once in his life.

At the same time that Hyuuga Hiashi was receiving the verbal thrashing that he deserved; Haruno Sakura entered the hospital, ready to start her shift. Being the apprentice to the greatest medic-nin in history, now currently the Godaime Hokage, Sakura had to assist at the hospital a few days a week.

Looking at the first file in front of her, she saw a name she hadn't seen for three years. She quickly ran towards the room where the blonde boy was sitting up talking with Hinata. Bursting into the room, Sakura looked at her former teammate.

"N-Naruto?" She asked, not believing that the teenager lying in a bed before her was once the shortest and loudest ninja she knew.

"Sakura-chan!" He exclaimed happily.

"Ohayo, Sakura." Said Hinata.

"Oh, Hinata, I didn't know you were in here too." Sakura said. "Why are you guys here anyway. I mean, Naruto was probably out practicing and hurt himself, but why are you wouldn't do something stupid like that, so what's up?"

"Oh, not much, I got back last night and well, one thing lead to another, and it ended up with us crashing into each other. Pretty stupid huh?" Lied Naruto, hoping it would work. He didn't want to explain how he killed two S-Class missing ninja in the span of about two minutes.

Sakura looked over the two. There weren't any signs that either one was injured, just tired. But something didn't add up, why would two people be in a hospital if they just ran into each other? 'Oh well' she decided. 'If they don't want to tell me, than I won't ask.'

"So what have you been doing Naruto? It's been a long time, since you've been back huh?" Sakura inquired.

"Only the most intense training you could imagine." He said, rather angrily. "That Ero-sennin knows all these jutsu's and then after I convince him to teach me one, he'll show it to me and then disappear. It sucks!" He stated, in an authoritative manner. "But what about you, are you still training with Tsunade-obaa-chan?" He asked.

As she was about to answer, a new figure entered the room. His Konoha forehead protector was pulled over his left eye, and his grey hair stood up at many different angles.

"Kakashi-sensei!" Exclaimed Naruto "What are you doing here?"

"Oh, not too much, I heard that you had returned and that you ended up here. I thought I'd check up on you." The lazy Jounin said.

"We're both fine." Naruto said. "Yeah, we just kinda ran into each other last night."

"Oh, Ok." Replied Kakashi. "Oh, before I forget, the Hokage wants to speak to the two of you when you are released." Kakashi motioned towards Naruto and Hinata. "Have a good day." He said, as he turned and exited the room.

'I wonder what Tsunade-obaa-chan wants us for' thought Naruto. He noticed that Sakura had gone to check on Hinata.

"Well, you're both in pristine condition, so when ever you two are ready, you can leave." She stated. "I've got to go check on my other patients, but we should get together later, you could tell us about your time."

"Yeah, ok." Naruto replied, flashing one of his trademark smiles. "Why don't you get all the other teams together, so I can see how everyone is doing." He suggested.

"Ok, I'll see you both later then, right?" Sakura asked

"Of course." Said Naruto.

With a small nod, Sakura left to continue wither her job.

About 20 minutes later, Naruto and Hinata exited the hospital and headed towards the Hokage's office. When they arrived, they were told by Shizune that Tsunade was meeting with Hiashi and that they could sit down and wait for a few minutes.

"Umm Naruto-kun, have you ever told anyone about the Kyuubi?" Asked Hinata rather sheepishly but without stuttering.

"No" replied the blonde. "You were the first person."

The only thing Hinata was able to say was a quiet "Oh."

After a few minutes, Tsunade's voice could be heard yelling for Shizune. After a few minutes of discussing whatever Tsunade needed, Shizune motioned for the two to enter.

Tsunade was seated behind her desk as usual, but was leaning on her elbows, trying to massage her temples. She motioned for the pair to be seated and continued rubbing her temples for a few minutes, while both teenagers sat quietly.

"Ok, first thing first" Tsunade said "Naruto, ANBU retrieved the body of Hoshigake Kisame early this morning. They didn't find any trace of Uchiha Itachi; however, they did note a large crater that fits the description of a suicide blast that you both described. I'm not extremely worried right now that Itachi, if he managed to survive, poses any kind of threat. However, if he is indeed dead than we might have a problem on our hands. If Sasuke finds out that you killed his brother, this might cause Orochimaru to seize Sasuke's body very soon. If word doesn't reach him, we still only have a month to find and stop Uchiha Sasuke before his body becomes the new container for Orochimaru."

"So you're saying that he might already be preparing to take Sasuke's body!" Exclaimed Naruto.

"Yes" replied Tsunade. "I think that Sasuke is still searching for his brother, so I want you to go and find Sasuke before Orochimaru can take his body"

"U-um H-h-hokage-sama, what does th-this have t-to do w-wi-with m-me?" questioned Hinata.

"Hinata, I want to ask you something that will require some thought on your part." The Godaime said. "If you want, I can alter your seal so that you will have access to the Nibi's chakra, like Naruto can use the Kyuubi's. Of course this is voluntary, if you don't want to, than that is perfectly fine."

"C-can't I-I already d-do that?" Asked the girl.

"Presently, both Jiraiya and I conclude that you can't. The wings that you were able to summon to protect you and Naruto, were due to a crack in the seal that almost killed you. I can alter the seal so that you can use it's chakra at your disposal." Replied Tsunade

"W-w-will there be a-any s-side affects?" Hinata stuttered

"I don't know, you'd have to ask Naruto, he's our resident expert on this sort of thing." Said the Hokage.

"Well, for me I sometimes have to visit the Kyuubi and talk with it, and every once in a while I'll end up having nightmares about things that it's done, but that's about it. I suppose you might end up with some markings like my whiskers, but I can't be sure." He said.

'If I do this' Hinata thought 'then I'll be strong, just like Naruto, but I might end up with a demon in my head. Oh, this is really tough.' Hinata thought for a while before she spoke.

"I want to do this." She said.

"Are you sure?" Asked Tsunade "because once it's done, reforming the seal you have now will be impossible."

"I'm sure." She said with no hint of uncertainty in her voice.

"All right, Naruto, I heard from Jiraiya that you spent a lot of time working on seals during your training. Is that true?" Asked Tsunade.

"Yeah, I spent a good bit of time learning everything I could about the different types of seals." Replied Naruto. He was worried that Hinata didn't know what she was getting herself into.

"Okay, then will you help Jiraiya and I convert Hinata's seal?" Asked Tsunade.

"Of course!" He stated.

Tsunade lead Hinata and Naruto to a large room with many different designs drawn on the floor. She positioned Hinata in the center of the design and lead Naruto towards the edges where they met with Jiraiya.

"Okay, Naruto, what we're about to do is transform the seal on Hinata's back so that she can access the Nibi's chakra. What we need is for you to pump a lot of chakra into the seal, while Tsunade re-draws the seal." Said the frog Hermit. Naruto simply nodded his head as he started towards one of the activation points of the design.

Tsunade had Hinata remove her jacket and was busy re-drawing the seal with her own blood. When she was done, she simply nodded towards Naruto who began to channel chakra through the station into the design on the ground. As he watched, the chakra began to snake towards Hinata. When it got to her, Jiraiya and Tsunade began to make hand seals so fast that Naruto would have problems keeping up, if he were paying attention. The only thing he was worried about was Hinata. 'What if I do something wrong, and I end up releasing the demon?' He thought. 'No, I won't mess up, I'm doing this right and besides, the two actually doing the sealing are two of the Sannin. Things will be fine.'

Both Jiraiya and Tsunade finished their seals at the same moment. As Tsunade placed her hand on Hinata's back, Hinata felt the old seal begin to tear apart. It wasn't breaking, just tearing. She felt the chakra of the Nibi no Aosagi flow into her own chakra coils. She had never felt such power before. Suddenly she felt an intense burning on her back as the new seal began to set. As it finished, the pain became unbearable as Hinata passed out. The last thing she saw was Naruto running towards her as she fell face forward towards the cold stone ground.

As Hinata began to fall, Naruto saw her and instinctively ran to grab her. He was able to get to the girl just before she hit the ground. He turned her over to check for a pulse, breathing a large sigh of relief when he found one.

"It's ok, Naruto, she just passed out. Give her a few minutes and she'll be fine." Said Tsunade. "Let's go put her in my office so I can check the new seal."

Hinata found herself in the middle of a field standing on a hill. Looking down, she saw a pond that didn't look familiar to her at all. She cautiously headed towards it taking careful note of her surroundings. As she approached the edge, she realized that the 'pond' was actually a very large lake, with a waterfall at the far end. Suddenly, the thick fog that was rolling around the area, began to dissipate. As Hinata looked through one of the clearings she noticed a shape moving in the water. Once it reached one of the clear patches, Hinata could instantly make it out to be a swan, which began to head towards her.

Hinata watched the swan as it slowly swam towards her.

"A-a-are you the Nibi no Aosagi?" Asked the girl.

"Yes." replied the swan without opening its beak.

"H-how can you t-t-talk without opening your b-beak?" queried Hinata.

"I can do many things that you humans cannot do." Replied the swan. "I'm guessing that you want to know where you are, am I correct?"

Hinata just nodded her head yes.

"You are in your subconscious, which I can now access. I cannot control you, the seal is too strong for me to attempt that, but I can make your subconscious fit my needs. I simply brought you to the lake that I used to inhabit. I am originally from Hidden Cloud, and I am afraid that I am the reason you were abducted when you were three. You see, I was the cloud's pride. I agreed to protect the village as long as they hadn't done anything to warrant it, and since I can change my appearance, I can gather information of that sort rather easily. So you see, it wasn't because the Cloud wanted the Byakugan, but because you were my vessel. I would like to apologize to you for that, you see, I am not a violent Youki, like the Kyuubi, or Shukaku. I am more interested in healing, and I believe that I may have jump started your interest in this particular field."

Hinata simply stood there thinking about what she had just learned.

"Ano, if you've been sealed inside me than how come we couldn't do this before? If my father hadn't told me of you than I never would have known." The shy girl asked without a stutter.

"It was the seal that your clan used to seal me inside of you. It stopped me from giving you any chakra, or be able to help you in any other way. Only now that the seal has been re-shaped can I talk with you." Replied the demon. "Although you haven't been able to notice me, I've been able to sense how you have grown up. I would like to train you to use my chakra and my abilities to help your friends."

"How c-could you tell, if you'd been sealed away?" Asked Hinata.

"The same way that I could tell if the Cloud shinobi deserved to be defended or not. It is another one of my gifts that I will train you with. You will be able to read people through body gestures and motions, much like your cousin. Although with my help, you will surpass him." Said the swan. "All of my training can be learned in your subconscious while you sleep, needing only to be practiced while you are awake."

"I will accept your offer. I will protect my friends, and I will not go back on my word. That is my nindo!" Exclaimed the usually shy Hinata.

"Very well then, I will train you beginning tonight." Replied the swan as she began to slowly fade into the fog.

Hinata awoke lying on a couch in the Hokage's office. Tsunade noticed that the girl had awakened walked over to help her sit up.

"The sealing was a success." She said. "If you want you can see the new seal. There is a mirror over there." She motioned towards the end of a tall cabinet.

Hinata strode towards the mirror and looked at the new seal. Instead of thick black loops and intricate designs running the length of her back and down to her elbows on her arms, there was simply a swirl pattern around her right shoulder blade that ended in a black diamond. The diamond pattern was repeated on the left shoulder blade, but the swirl was unique to the right.

Hinata was happy with the new seal. She could now wear normal clothes without having to worry if people saw the old seal. She thanked the Hokage for her help in the procedure and went to retrieve her coat.

"Please wait a moment Hinata." Said the blonde Hokage. She opened the door and allowed Naruto and Jiraiya to re-enter the room. Taking seats again they wondered what the Hokage was thinking.

"Ok, Naruto, as you know I've appointed you to find and return Uchiha Sasuke to the village before he can become Orochimaru's new vessel. You will leave tomorrow morning in hopes of drawing him out. If he is searching for Itachi still, than he should find you. I want you to take a full team with you. Jiraiya will be the leader, but he will not be fighting unless Orochimaru, or Kabuto appear in an attempt to claim Sasuke. I also want Hinata to accompany you. Now that she has conferred with the Nibi, her healing skills will be invaluable. The third member can be any chunnin or gennin you wish. Since you are the only the member of the 'Rookie 9' to not attain the rank of chunnin yet, you should try to meet up with them so you can see how everyone has changed over the three years that you were gone and make the final selection for your team." Tsunade gave the group sitting in front of her the mission briefing and dismissed them.

As they were leaving Hokage tower, they ran into Sakura who was just leaving the hospital. Naruto and Hinata departed from Jiraiya to go collect the other members of the Rookie 9.

As the sun was going down on Konohagakure that night, a lone figure sped towards the town. His normally black eyes turned crimson and three comma-like marks began to spin around his iris. He paused a moment to check his surroundings. Finding no trace of his prey, the boy continued through the trees. "Where are you brother?" He would say in a voice that sounded a lot like a predator playing with its prey before the kill. Uchiha Sasuke had returned to Konoha.


	3. Chapter 3

Naruto, Hinata and Sakura headed towards the Hokage monument. There they saw eight people talking amongst themselves. The Rookie 9 as they had once been called had grown up. Inuzuka Kiba was chatting with Yamanaka Ino. Both had grown considerably since Naruto had last seen them, Kiba was taller, and leaner. His nin-dog Akamaru had grown as well. He was too large to fit into Kiba's coat now, and was running about chasing butterflies. Ino had re-grown her hair, it has shorter than before she cut it, and was pulled into a pig-tail, like before. Aburame Shino and Hyuuga Neji were currently engaged in their favorite pastime, not talking. Shino had grown taller, and now wore a coat with a hood over his hair and a pair of black pants. He still sported is trademark sunglasses, hiding his eyes. Hyuuga Neji was the only Jounin among the group. It was a newly acquired rank, and as such he was still doing missions with his former gennin team. He was taller, and his dark hair had grown even longer. He looked every bit like his father and unless one knew that Hyuuga Hizashi was dead, they easily would have mistaken his son for the father. Nara Shikamaru and his best friend Akimichi Choji were seated under a tree, Shikamaru was engrossed in cloud gazing, and Choji was inhaling his bag of chips with the same vigor that Naruto had remembered. Choji had grown taller, and had gained weight too, but that was to be expected in the Akimichi clan. Shikamaru looked the same as always, but he was starting to grow a goatee.

As the Trio of new comers arrived, Sakura went off to talk with Rock Lee. Lee hadn't changed one bit, at least on the outside. He still wore the green spandex suit and orange leg warmers. He still had the same bowl hair cut and same disturbingly thick eyebrows.

"Lee-san and Sakura-san started dating about a year ago." Hinata said when she saw the puzzled look Naruto had.

"Oh, well it's nice to see that she has gotten over Sasuke." He replied.

Ten Ten came over and started talking to Sakura as Hinata and Naruto made their way towards the others. When the remaining shinobi noticed Naruto, all conversation stopped immediately.

"N-naruto?" Asked Kiba.

"Hey Kiba, yeah I'm back. I thought it'd be nice to meet everyone again." Naruto replied.

As Naruto was bombarded with questions about his absence, Hyuuga Hiashi was about to snap. Upon learning that the council had lied to him for 15 years about his daughters seal, he couldn't help but wonder why? Why would the council lie to him about his daughter's strength? Then it hit him. The council had seen exactly what he had seen, enormous potential and strength. The council was afraid of what Hinata would be able to do, even without the Nibi's chakra. They were trying to turn him against his daughter. They new that they could never hope to control her if she had access to the chakra of the two tailed demon. As he headed back to the Hyuuga complex, he grew more and more incensed. He was going to fix the wrongs that had been committed against his daughter for the past 15 years of her life.

The moon began to creep higher in the sky as the Rookie 9 were telling Naruto of all the happenings that he had missed in his three years away. Around nine o'clock the group began to disband and drift towards their separate homes. It was then that Naruto pulled Sakura and Lee away to discuss his mission the next day.

"Hey, Sakura-chan, Lee, can I talk with you two for a second?" Naruto asked, almost under his breath.

They both nodded, noting the new seriousness in his voice.

"Tsunade-obaa-chan wants Ero-sennin, Hinata-chan and me to go get Sasuke tomorrow, before that snake bastard can take his body. She said I could choose any one I wanted from as long as they were chunnin or gennin. I want to take both of you, and I don't care what she says. Sakura, we're going to need your healing skills, and Lee your taijutsu will be very hard for him to fight against if we need to. I just wanted to know if you would come with me tomorrow. Oh, it's an A-class mission" Naruto asked.

The two teens just looked at each other, knowing that Naruto spoke the truth. Neither of them knew about the nibi in Hinata, but they had both seen the damage that Naruto had received last time he fought Sasuke, and agreed that a medic nin would be a good addition to the team.

"We'll go with you." Sakura said.

"All right, you'd better get some sleep; we meet at the north gate at seven sharp." Naruto instructed as he departed to walk Hinata back to the Hyuuga complex.

"You're right, Hinata-chan, Lee really has calmed down a bit under Sakura's influence." He said.

"Yes, Lee-san has been much quieter since he started dating Sakura-chan." Hinata replied. Sakura had insisted on Hinata caller her Sakura-chan instead of Sakura-san. She said it made her feel old.

"Naruto-kun, this is the complex." Hinata said as they reached her home.

Suddenly, the sounds of fighting broke the quiet of the night. Both teenagers rushed into the complex, to find Hiashi fighting the council head. Hiashi was worn out from the fight and couldn't move as the council head called out his attack:

"**Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou**!" (Eight Trigrams: 64 palms) yelled the council head.

"Two hands. Four Hands. Eight hands. Sixteen hands. Thirty-two hands. Sixty-four hands!" Hiashi slumped to the ground as 64 of his tenketsu's were forcibly closed.

Hinata ran towards her father. He had passed out from chakra depletion, and was very close to death. Behind her, Naruto created a shadow clone and sent it to find Tsunade.

"You'll pay for hurting my father." Hinata said in a cold voice.

"And what do you think you can do about it?" Asked the council head. "You can't even beat your sister, and she is younger than you by five years."

Hinata didn't say anything as she stood up and adopted a Jyuken stance. Her opponent did the same, and Hinata charged him. She aimed the index and middle fingers of her right hand at the man's heart. He simply dodged her attack and went to close a tenketsu on her outstretched hand. She quickly changed her attack and sent an elbow at the man's head. He was forced to block her attack and was forced back as Hinata kept attacking him. He simply dodged her attacks, although she was doing a good job of keeping him on the defensive so he couldn't seal any of her tenketsu points. She again sent her right hand at his heart, but this time instead of shifting to his left, he shifted right, and caught Hinata off guard. She sent her left arm toward the council head, but he simply grabbed her arm and sealed three tenketsu, rendering her arm useless. In Hinata's moment of shock, the council head took the offensive.

"**Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou**!" He said, as he attacked Hinata's inner coils. "Two hands. Four Hands. Eight hands. Sixteen hands. Thirty-two hands. Sixty-four hands!" Hinata flew backwards and was caught by Naruto. He laid her on the ground; she was clearly not in any condition to fight.

"You…I'LL KILL YOU!" He screamed. Naruto formed his favorite seal. He was about to create a large number of shadow clones, when a sudden chakra spike caught his attention. He looked around and saw Hinata standing. Even without the byakugan, Naruto knew what was happening to Hinata's chakra. The nibi was lending Hinata her chakra.

"No, Naruto, this fight is mine, and mine alone." Hinata said, calling off the blonde.

"H-how can you stand up after that attack?" asked the older man, clearly afraid of the new energy that had overtaken Hinata.

Hinata simply removed her overly large coat and stared the man down. No longer did she have thick black loops and lines around her arms. She stood before the council member in a white t-shirt and calmly adapted the jyuken stance again.

"Tsunade-sama was kind enough to alter the seal that imprisoned the nibi for 15 years. I can now use her chakra as if it were my own." Came Hinata's reply.

Suddenly large white wings sprouted from Hinata's back.

"That feels better." She said, with a hint of malice in her voice.

"Demon! I'll kill you!" Shouted the council head as he charged towards Hinata and Naruto.

Hinata simply flapped her large chakra wings and calmly said:

"**Kamaitachi**." (Cutting Whirlwind)

A large gust of chakra infused wind caught the attacking man and hurled him into thick support beam, which he passed through until he impacted a wall and slid down to the floor, unconscious

Just then, Tsunade entered along with Naruto's shadow clone, who upon completing its task, quickly poofed out of existence. Tsunade just stared in awe, at the sight of Hinata with large white wings and the damage caused by the fighting. She quickly made her way over towards Hiashi, while Naruto approached Hinata.

"Hinata-chan, are you ok?" Naruto asked.

Hinata heard Naruto's question, but didn't reply. She took long deep breaths, and clenched her fists. Her wings began to shrink and recede into her back, as the last bit of white disappeared she fell to her knees.

"Are you ok?" Naruto asked again.

"H-h-hai, i-its j-just that I-I've n-never f-f-felt s-so much p-power before." Replied Hinata.

Naruto placed a comforting hand on her shoulder, and crouched down with her.

"I know how you feel. The thrill, it's exhilarating, it's like I feel invincible, and I could take on the world." He said in a comforting way.

Just then, Tsunade came over.

"Hinata, your father is going to be fine, but he'll be unconscious for a while. Do you have any idea what happened?" She asked.

Hinata simply shook her head as her eyes made their way over to way her father lay. Tsunade proceeded to check on every member of the council. They were either, dead or in the case of the council head, beaten and battered within inches of their life. Just then a squad of ANBU came in the room. They waited for the Hokage's orders silently.

"I want all of the wounded transported to the hospital, including Hiashi-sama. I also want the rooms of the council members guarded, and they are under no circumstances to leave. When Hiashi-sama regains consciousness, tell me." Tsunade ordered. The ANBU quickly went about their task and had soon cleared out the room.

"It was a miracle that nobody else heard the fighting." Said Tsunade. "You two should get some rest. You have a big mission tomorrow. Speaking of which, Naruto, did you pick the other member of your team?"

"Hai, I picked Sakura and Lee. Sakura has a right to do this, the same as I do, and Lee's taijutsu will be hard for Sasuke to fight." Replied Naruto.

"Naruto! I said you could pick one, one person." Tsunade sighed. "But I see your point. You can take them both, but under one condition, if you can't find Sasuke in three weeks, than you must send one of the two back, I can't afford to have too many people gone on this mission."

Naruto simply nodded. Tsunade left, to go check in at the hospital leaving Naruto and Hinata alone in the destroyed council room.

"Tsunade-obaa-chan is right, Hinata-chan, we should get some rest." He said, turning towards her. She was still kneeling where her father had been before, in a state of shock. She wasn't sure if it was because her father was almost killed in front of her, or if it was because she had used the nibi's chakra for the first time. She didn't hear anything Naruto or Tsunade had just said, and she didn't notice anything until Naruto came and pulled her onto her feet. Lifting her chin, he looked into her white eyes and saw tears beginning to well up.

"Hinata, your dad will be fine. If Tsunade-obaa-chan says he'll be fine, that there's nothing to worry about." He said calmly. "I'm more worried about you; you had all of your tenketsu's closed. When Neji closed mine, I was really tired for a while afterwards.

'Naruto-kun is worried about me?' She thought. "You're right, Naruto-kun, if Hokage-sama say's he'll be ok, than he will be. I was just felt that I was useless just then, I couldn't help him, I don't have the skill to do that, and I almost didn't beat the head of the council. I really should head to bed now, if I want to be of any help tomorrow."

"Don't say that Hinata-chan, of course you'll be helpful on the mission. Just get some sleep and I'll come pick you up around 7:30." Naruto replied. "I'll see you tomorrow."

With those parting words, Naruto left and headed home. Hinata followed suit and went into her room where she laid down and fell asleep instantaneously.

The next day, Hinata awoke at 6:00, and took a shower to relax her at least somewhat. It was a good thing that she woke up early, because in the aftermath of the previous night, she hadn't packed anything. She quickly packed enough medical supplies for the five people in the group, and a few changes of clothes. She checked her supply of shuriken and kunai before she headed towards the kitchen to grab some food. The cooks were just beginning to make breakfast when she entered and quickly grabbed some toast and a glass of water. While she was leaving, she heard the muttering of the kitchen staff.

"Did you see the council room?"

"Yeah, what do you think happened? I heard Hiashi-sama attacked all of them and that more than half are dead."

"I don't know, but something terrible must have happened in there."

With that Hinata left and headed towards the front gate to meet Naruto.

Naruto had just arrived at the front of the Hyuuga compound when Hinata exited.

"Hey Hinata-chan, are you ready to go?" He asked.

"Yes." She said simply. "Thank you, Naruto-kun."

"What for?" He asked

"Well, for everything, I never thanked you for helping me last night, or for rescuing me from the Akatsuki." She said, blushing.

"It's ok, Hinata-chan, I'd never let one of those lunatics hurt any of my friends."

The two arrived at the north gate to find Lee already there and Sakura came only a minute after Naruto and Hinata. Jiraiya showed up a few minutes later, and they left to find Sasuke.

After five hours of searching, the group took a break for lunch. As they were about half way through, Hinata's byakugan detected movement behind them. Before she could warn the others, a multitude of kunai and shuriken hummed through the air, at the group. Before anyone reacted, Hinata acted.

"**Shugohakke Rokujyuu Yonshou**!" (Eight Trigrams guard: 64 palms)

She began to emit chakra spikes from her fingertips, destroying, or diverting all of the oncoming projectiles.

Sasuke watched as all his shuriken and kunai were destroyed by the supposedly weakest member of the team. It became obvious to him, that even if he had his sharingan active, he doubted weather he could copy that attack. Quickly he reorganized his attack strategy and decided to focus on his pink haired ex-teammate. Breaking his cover, Sasuke dashed at Sakura, only to be greeted by Lee's right foot.

'Since when did Lee get that fast?' he thought

He quickly re-gained his posture, sliding a few feet. As he stood up, he was met by Naruto's fist.

'Damn it! When did Naruto learn to hit like that?'

Rising to his feet, he saw Lee and Naruto charging him. He was able to dodge Naruto's punch, but Lee made solid contact with his chest hurling him back and driving the wind from him.

"Damn it!" He cursed out loud. 'Am I really that weak?' he thought. Activating the first level of his cursed seal, Sasuke looked intimidating. As black flames snaked around his skin, he felt the now familiar boost in chakra the seal allowed him. With his new found speed he leapt over Lee and Naruto and charged Sakura, sharingan blazing. As readied his attack, he saw Sakura smirk, and pull her fist back. He didn't pay attention. Nothing she could do could faze him in the least. Of course, when you're trained by the legendary Tsunade, you pick up a few things. One of them being inhuman strength. The punch connected and sent him flying through five or six trees before he was greeted by a fire ball from Naruto. He dodged the attack, but found himself facing Lee. Lee went to strike his chest again, but Sasuke was able to dodge it, thanks to the cursed seal. He then landed his own punch to Lee's stomach. Lee jumped back a bit, but was mostly not fazed. This startled Sasuke. The punch he had just landed should have been enough to drive the air from Lee's lungs, but instead, the thick eye-browed teen just stood there waiting for the next move. Sasuke stared at Lee with such intensity that he almost failed to notice Naruto's attack. He saw the blonde aim a punch at his face and dodged it, but he failed to notice the clone that had snuck underneath him. Giving a kick, the clone launched Sasuke into the air, where he met the real Naruto's fist, sending him back towards the earth, where he met up with Lee's palm. An attack that should have broken his back ended up breaking a log, as Sasuke used kawarimi no jutsu to escape the brunt of the damage.

"Damn it!" Sasuke swore again. 'How did they become so strong?' He then activated the second level of the cursed seal. The black flames began to mold themselves into a black that covered his entire skin, and his black hair turned pale white. Two fleshy wings then sprouted from his back. Charging a chidori, he attacked Lee. With inhuman speed he landed in front of the green clad ninja and delivered his attack to the boy's heart. But Lee was fast enough to dodge a portion of the attack. Instead of his heart being ripped from his body, the chidori took a chunk out of his side under his left arm. Staggering backwards, Lee was caught by Naruto, who immediately rushed him to Sakura and Hinata who began to heal him. Naruto returned his attention to Sauske.

Given no other option, Naruto called on the Kyuubi for chakra. The demon fox obliged and Naruto felt the chakra engulf him and take the form of two tails behind him. Charging at Sasuke, Naruto delivered a strike that would have broken Sasuke's rib cage, had he not dodged it. With the sharingan active and in his second level form, Sasuke was very fast. The two boys exchanged blows at such a rapid pace that Lee was having trouble keeping up with them. The girls had given up a while ago, and were most startled by Sasuke's transformations.

"Do you think the outcome will be any different than last time?" Sasuke goaded Naruto.

"Yes" Said Naruto. He was beginning to worry, because currently Sasuke was beating him with only two tails.

Sasuke and Naruto kept up their attacks and continued to pummel each other into the ground. Eventually, Sasuke landed a sharp right hook to Naruto's jaw that sent him spinning backwards. Not wasting the opportunity, Sasuke performed a bunch of hand seals, and spat a fire ball towards Naruto. The attack hit home and due to the intensity of the blaze, the ball became a column of fire, reaching a good 15 feet high. Sakura, Hinata, and Lee were all worried about their friend. Until a body removed its self from the inferno. Naruto appeared to be unharmed but what puzzled people the most was the addiction of two new chakra tails at his back.

At this, Sasuke began to panic. He could feel the seal try to overcome his brain. He had to fight it. 'I haven't killed Itachi yet!' He screamed in his head.

"Naruto, it looks like I'll have to make this quick, I still have a certain person to kill after I dispatch of you." Sasuke growled as he formed chidori.

Naruto didn't respond, but formed Rasengan in his hand to counter chidori. The two charged each other, oblivious to their surroundings. When each was about a yard away from each other, they thrust both of their attacks forward. But Naruto once again find it in himself to kill his teammate. He was aiming to at least take off Sasuke's arm though. Just as both attacks were about to meet, a figure in a black cloak with red clouds appeared between the boys and took both attacks.

Sasuke was shocked to see his brother Itachi take a chidori and rasengan to the body. He froze up as Itachi, seemed to wrap is arms around his younger brother. Itachi knew he was dying. The rasengan to his side that he sustained earlier was fatal, and he had just managed to hide underground when he turned his remaining chakra into an explosion. Knowing it would be the last thing he did in this life, he wrapped his arms around Sasuke and began performing hand seals.

The only one who could see what was transpiring was Jiraiya. He watched as Itachi preformed seal after seal even as his heart began to fail. But Jiraiya wasn't a sannin for nothing. He recognized the seals and what would happen when Itachi was finished.

Itachi finished the seals and felt the last of his life escape from him. Sasuke felt a hot burning into his back as his cursed seal receded and he passed out from the pain.

Naruto was the first one to run towards the bodies. He knew that Itachi was dead, but he didn't know what he had done to Sasuke. Jiraiya quickly joined him, as the other three hurried over to check on Naruto.

"Well I'll be damned." Jiraiya said examining what Itachi had done. "It's a modification on the **Fuuja Houin **(Evil Sealing technique), but instead of relying on a person's will, Itachi changed it so that he could control it. Only problem was that it cost him his life."

"Jiraiya-sama how will we get these two back to Konoha? We will already have to slow down for Lee." Asked Sakura.

"I guess I'll call some ANBU and they'll take them back. We'll have to wait until they show up though." Replied the frog hermit.

After a couple of hours, a squadron of ANBU arrived and took the body of Uchiha Itachi and the comatose Uchiha Sasuke back to Konoha. The team assigned to return him arrived a little after sunset. Happy to have that mission over with, the team returned home and was happy to get some sleep for their troubles.


	4. Chapter 4

Two weeks had passed since Uchiha Sasuke had been returned to Konoha. According to reports, he should be waking up from extreme chakra depletion any time today. This was but one of the many topics of gossip floating around the city.

"Did you hear that Uzumaki Naruto is back?" One villager would say.

"Yeah, did you hear that he brought back both Uchihas, and killed the older one?" Another would say.

"I heard that Hyuuga Hiashi attacked the Hyuuga council, because they did something to him."

"No, no, it was because they married his daughter off, I think"

This form of banter would continue for a while, until all parties would become bored, or something else would come up. In the days after the mission to return Sasuke, those who had been there, were constantly hounded with questions surrounding the death of Itachi, and the return of the youngest Uchiha. One person was noticeably absent from the questioning. Hyuuga Hinata had, upon returning, gone immediately to her father's bed in the hospital until he regained consciousness. He had awoken, the day after the parties return, and was dismissed from the hospital a day later. Tsunade had asked him about the fight during his day of rest. Although, she had a good idea of what had transpired, she needed to have some kind of a record. Hinata sat in a chair, during her father's testimony. She was shocked to hear that he had taken on the council, for her. After Tsunade left, there was a moment of awkward silence as Hinata pondered over her father's actions.

_**Flashback**_

"Hinata," Hiashi broke the tense silence "I… I wish to apologize, for the way I have been treating you. The council had convinced me that you would be able to use the power inside of you to fight. When you couldn't I made the incorrect assumption that you were weak. I believe that the council had wanted me to disown you, so that they could brand you with the Bunke (Hyuuga cursed seal) and control you. I was blinded by their words, and was unable to see you as I should have…as my daughter. I am truly sorry that you have had to live your life as the pawn of old and decrepit men, and myself. I…I hope…that you can forgive me for my atrocities."

Hinata was quite surprised by her father's admission. The first thing she had learned under the Nibi was how to read people based on their posture and mannerisms. Her father was sincerely sorry for what had happened to her.

"I…it's all right, father." She said.

"Thank you, Hinata, I know it must be difficult to comprehend right now, but I only wished for you to achieve your highest potential." Hiashi stated, his head bowed slightly. "Now, I heard from Hokage-sama that you defeated the head of the council by yourself. Is that true?"

"H-hai, father, I did beat him, although I was forced to call on the Nibi's charka. Tsunade-sama changed the seal, so that I could draw off some of its chakra, like Naruto-kun."

"That is very impressive, even though you had to use the demon's chakra. You did a good job, Hinata."

_**End Flashback**_

Since then, Hiashi had been very supportive of Hinata and Hinata had become more confidant in her abilities and in herself as a result. Which was how she ended up on a date with Uzumaki Naruto. Well, a date might be a bit of an exaggeration. Although he had become closer friends with the Hyuuga heir, Naruto was still clueless as to her feelings. As much as she loved him, he was oblivious. In fact, as the two were eating ramen together, waiting for Sasuke to awaken, Naruto was clueless to everything around him. Over the past two weeks, he had slowly begun to drift away from Sakura. He still felt love for her, although, it seemed that she was very happy with Lee, and he wasn't one to pry them apart, simply for his own gain. 'A hokage must put the good of the many before the good of themselves' he repeated in his head. As he slowly drifted away from Sakura, he was beginning to gravitate towards, a certain indigo haired, white eyed girl. He just didn't realize that she shared his feelings.

They finished up their ramen, (Hinata had one bowl, while Naruto ate six bowls.) and headed towards the hospital, to check on Sasuke. When they arrived, Tsunade and Kakashi were entering the room.

"Hey Kakashi-sensei, is he awake yet?" Asked Naruto from across the hallway.

"Yo," replied Kakashi with his usual greeting "he just woke up and Hokage-sama is going to figure out his punishment. You two should stay outside, we don't know how he will respond if he sees you right now.

With that Kakashi entered the room, leaving the two to wait. Naruto and Hinata sat down in uncomfortable hospital chairs in silence. After a while, Hinata had to leave to join her team for a short mission. Naruto wished her luck and waited for Tsunade to finish up with Sasuke.

Inside the room the mood was tense. Tsunade had inspected the seal that Itachi had sacrificed himself to place over Orochimaru's cursed seal, and was surprised by it. It would keep all influences, mental and physical, from tainting the boy. Sasuke was awake and waiting when the two entered his room. He was scared of the Godaime and felt a sickening sensation when he looked at Kakashi.

"Uchiha Sasuke, you are charged with treason for fleeing this village and joining the ranks of Orochimaru, you were branded an A-class missing nin, for fleeing with an important bloodline limit, and were to be captured or killed were any shinobi of this village to see you. As I am sure you are aware, the penalty for treason is death." Tsunade stated. "However, due to the insistence of a number of your former comrades and friends, I will offer you a chance to explain your actions to me and _if_ I find something reasonable in them, a new punishment may be handed down."

Sasuke was surprised at the news. He was sure; he would be killed for abandoning Konoha, and was even more shocked to find, that he still had people in the village that counted him as a friend.

"I…I can't shed any blame for my actions. After the mission to tea country, I saw how powerful Naruto had become, and it … angered me. Well, not anger really, more like, I was mad because he did something that I couldn't. It didn't make any sense, he's supposed to be the dead last, not… he can't do…" Sasuke stumbled over his words as he continued on, not sure what happened, now that he was looking over his actions.

"Can you tell me what made you hate Naruto?" interrupted Kakashi.

"The fight on the roof, after you threw our attacks into the water tanks, I was sure that I had won, because the hole around my arm was bigger, but then I saw the back of Naruto's tank. I..it had been completely demolished, like something had blown up inside of it. That's when it hit me, that he had gotten stronger than me… and IT WASN'T FAIR" Sasuke yelled those words so loudly that Naruto heard them outside.

'It's my fault that he left.' Naruto thought sadly. 'Maybe I should tell him, if he knows about the Kyuubi, then maybe he won't hate me anymore.'

Back in the room, things weren't looking good for Sasuke. He hadn't told them anything that they didn't already know, and his actions, were completely his own.

"Sasuke, I'm ashamed that you did this because, Naruto was stronger than you. Just because he was branded as 'dead last' doesn't mean anything. If you thought that loosing to the rasengan was some kind of travesty, you should know who created that attack. That is the Yondaime Hokage's signature attack, and even the chidori is not as powerful as the rasengan." Kakashi said, a tint of sadness marring his voice.

That struck home with Sasuke. If it was really the fourth Hokage's attack, than there was nothing to be ashamed about. The fourth is the greatest Hokage that ever lived, and if it was his _signature_ attack, than there is way that a chidori could ever beat it, probably. It was at this point that a knock came at the door. When Tsunade gave clearance for who ever was outside, to enter, the door opened, and revealed an old man with white spiky hair.

"Oh, so he's up now, good thing too. If he was out any longer, I might have thought he was dead." The man exclaimed.

"Sasuke, this is Jiraiya, another of the sannin, like Orochimaru and I." said Tsunade. "He has been training Naruto for the past three years, and knows him the best."

"So was the gaki right?" Jiraiya asked Tsunade, still eyeing Sasuke.

"From the looks of things, yes. Sasuke got jealous of Naruto after a fight they had, and well, you know the story from there." Replied the Hokage.

"You're lucky kid." Jiraiya said, directing the remark at Sasuke. "That idiot apprentice of mine spent the last three years training with me, and the last year of that was spent on seals, partly for his own gain, but mostly for yours. He figured out that the seal you had was blowing you're emotions out of control. It turned, relatively innocent jealousy into hate, and that made you leave. How much of the second fight you had, do you remember?" asked the old man.

'The seal was affecting my mind?' thought Sasuke. 'But I thought that the seal Kakashi placed over it should have stopped it.' "I can remember fighting Naruto and Lee, and then Itachi stopped my attack, and did something. After that I can't remember anything." Replied the boy.

"Itachi, used a variation of the Fuuja Houin (Evil sealing technique) that was originally placed over the seal. But instead of relying on the will of the person, to whom it is attached, it relies on another source, and stops all influences of the seal from spreading to you." Jiraiya explained.

"My brother…WHERE IS HE… where is my brother?" demanded Sasuke.

"Uchiha Itachi was killed during the fight, and was returned to Konoha the same as you were. In case you were wondering, it is impossible to tell who killed him. There was so much damage to his body, that it was impossible to tell who gave the fatal blow. Due to your previous history and the fact that, and we agree, you had the right to avenge your clan, credit will go to you for the kill." Replied the Godaime, in a calm voice.

Sasuke was shocked to hear that. Mostly he was shocked, that even as a traitor, he was given credit for killing his brother.

"Due to the seal's influence on your mind, you will not be executed, however, you will be suspended as a ninja for a while, you will be supervised by Kakashi, and will have ANBU making sure that you don't attempt to repeat your earlier stunts." Explained Tsunade. "Now, I believe someone outside is here to see you."

With that, she opened the door, and went to find Naruto. After a few minutes of silence, the Hokage returned with the blonde boy, who had a rather dejected and sad look on his face. Upon seeing his former team mate, Sasuke immediately decided that the look didn't suit Naruto. He shut the door behind him and just looked at Sasuke.

"Naruto…I'm sorry for what I did to you, a-at the Valley of the End. I was just so angry at you, for being better than me that I snapped and ran." Sasuke said.

"No, Sasuke, I should be the one to apologize, if I could have told you…if I could have kept my power… I heard what you said earlier and I'm the one who is sorry." Naruto tried to explain. "I just want you to know, that to gain power, you really have to give up something. I hope you realize that, now."

Naruto went to leave the room when Sasuke's voice echoed through the room.

"If you don't mind, what did you give up for the power you have? I know that you work hard, but so do I and I can't get anywhere near your level. What did you do?" He asked.

Naruto froze in his tracks. His shoulders tensed up and he looked over at the boy lying in the bed.

"Sasuke, normally, I wouldn't do this, but if it helps you to come to grips with the past, than maybe it should have been done earlier. I just want you to swear to all of us in this room right now, that what ever happens, it stays between us. At least for right now." Naruto spoke in a slow and deliberate tone of voice that conveyed the emotional battle in his mind right now. Sasuke looked around the room at the other three people present. They all had looks of surprise on their faces, and a little bit of pain as well. What ever Naruto had in mind, it must be big. Sasuke nodded to the blonde boy and waited for the answer to the question that drove him away.

"You know the story about the Kyuubi, attacking the village and the Yondaime defeating it at the cost of his own life, correct? That story is just a fabrication of the truth. The Kyuubi attacked and the Yondaime did defeat the demon. But he didn't or couldn't kill it so he sealed it inside of a new born child. H-he sealed it inside me. I carry the most deadly demon known to this world in me, and have since I was born. It wasn't until Mizuki told me that I was aware of it. As a result of the Kyuubi, the people of this village hate me. Since I entered the academy, I have had rocks thrown at my apartment nightly, people glare at me with disgust in public, and I am not welcome in over half of the stores in Konoha. People don't see me as Uzumaki Naruto, they see me as the Kyuubi no Kitsune that attacked fifteen years ago, and cost the Yondaime his life. I haven't given up things, as much as I have been deprived of them since before I can remember."

As Naruto's speech concluded, Sasuke was left dumbstruck. His own teammate was the vessel for the nine-tailed demon and he didn't know. Sasuke was sucked into his own thoughts so deeply that he didn't notice Naruto leave the room. Only when Kakashi spoke up did he return to reality.

"Sasuke, I hope that you can see that Naruto is right. He has had more taken away than all of us for the power he carries inside of him, and as payment for holding the most feared demon in check, he is loathed by the town. Yet he trains and works as much as is possible. He wants to become Hokage so that they will have to respect him. It isn't some kind of childish dream, in all reality, I doubt if the townspeople will ever respect him if he doesn't become Hokage. True strength can only be attained by giving. Naruto has come to realize that over the past few years and I hope that you can learn that too." He left without another word. Soon after Jiraiya left, claiming that there was more research to be done leaving only the Hokage and one confused and puzzled boy.

"He thinks of you like the brother he never had." Tsunade said quietly. "He would protect you until he was dead if it came it. I want you to think about something while I'm gone. You wanted two things when you became a gennin. To avenge your clan and then to repopulate it. You've accomplished one, and thanks to Naruto, your life has been saved so that you can complete your second goal. I hope that something you have heard today has sunk in, and that I made the correct decision in not turning you over to a council to decide your punishment. What Naruto told you is an S-class secret and cannot be told to anyone. If you do, you will be arrested, and my ruling today, will be overthrown. In short, if you tell anyone about the Kyuubi, than you will be killed."

She left the room, and Sasuke was left to ponder all of the things he had learned. There was a lot of information to go through. Sasuke stayed up late into the night thinking about what Naruto had said about how to gain power. As he drifted to sleep Sasuke let his mind come to its own conclusion.

'To be strong is to protect those who are precious to you. To be powerful requires that you give up something. That is how I shall live my life. I will protect that which I care about, and now that Itachi is dead, I can give up on that ambition and focus on my others. I only hope that the others will see me like Naruto does. It will be a long time before anyone trusts me again. That is what I have given up. I gave up my friends trust. I will never do that again. I have been given a chance to atone for my sins, and I plan on taking that chance.'

As his eyes closed, Sasuke found a new peace about his life. Without his brother hanging over him anymore, Sasuke felt a great weight lifted off his shoulders. Tomorrow he would start to regain the trust he had lost from the village.


	5. Chapter 5

When Sasuke awoke the next day, images of the previous day flooded his mind. There was Naruto telling him, that he had the Kyuubi sealed within him for the past fifteen years. That single fact was weighing heavily on Sasuke's mind.

"If I knew he had the Kyuubi, than I never would have left. There's no way I can hope to come close to the amount of chakra Naruto must have. If the fourth couldn't kill it, than there is no way in hell that I can kill it. I'm one selfish bastard."

Sasuke's thoughts were interrupted by a check up from Tsunade and the news that he couldn't leave for a few more day, but he was allowed some visitors, although they would be limited to his former team. Surprisingly enough, the first one to show up was Naruto. The blonde had come incase Sasuke needed to talk about what he had learned. Initially, that is how the conversation began. But after half an hour of talking about the Kyuubi and Naruto, the conversation shifted towards the village.

"Say, Naruto, h-how are all of the others? I'm kinda surprised that Sakura hasn't shown up yet." Sasuke joked.

"Well, I've been out training for the past three years, and I just got back a few days ago, but from what I can tell, they're all fine. Neji is a jounin, and everyone else is a chunnin, except for me. I think the reason that Sakura-chan isn't here is because she started dating Rock Lee. She seems pretty happy." Naruto recapped his talks with the other former rookies.

"Sakura and Lee?" Asked a shocked Sasuke. "I do not want to think about what their kids would look like."

"Yeah, just imagine it. Pink-fuzzy brows!" Exclaimed Naruto.

Both teenagers found this extremely hilarious and spent the next minute or two laughing.

"Do…do you think that they'll hate me?" Sasuke asked after regaining his composure, instantly killing the light mood.

"I don't know Sasuke. I doubt that Sakura will, and I don't. I doubt that Shino will, but then again, no one can tell what he's feeling. I think that the five of us that went off after you the first time, might think you are great big idiot, but I doubt anyone will hate you. Heck, I bet Ino tries to ask you out within twenty minutes of you leaving this place."

"I hope you're right Naruto. I really do, because I'm going to gain all of their trust back." Said Sasuke.

Naruto took a look at the clock on the wall and realized that he had to meet with Tsunade in a few minutes.

"Hey, I've got to meet with Tsunade-obaa-chan in a few minutes, but after that I'll try to make it back here." As Naruto moved towards the door, he stopped and without turning around said "Sasuke, you are like the brother I never had. If you need anything while you're here or even after you get out, just find me."

With those words, Naruto left leaving Sasuke to his thoughts once again.

Naruto waited outside Tsunade's office. She was meeting with some representatives from Suna and was about to finish up. When the representatives left, Shizune motioned form Naruto to enter. Naruto walked into the room and saw that the Hokage was smiling.

"Meeting go that good?" He asked.

"Well, it went all right, but I've never been great with diplomacy. I called you here, for a bit of good news. Since you retrieved Uchiha Sasuke, I'm going to officially promote you to chunnin, and before you say anything, I would have promoted you to Jounin, based on Jiraiya's report, but since the Jounin exams are in a couple of months, I think you can gain the title then." With that, she handed Naruto a chunnin vest.

"Thanks, Baa-chan, I'll definitely enter the next jounin exam, and kick everyone's ass too!" Replied the overly exuberant boy before a fist connected with his face.

"WHAT HAVE I SAID ABOUT CALLING ME THAT!" The Hokage yelled.

Unbeknownst to Konoha and at the exact moment Naruto was being promoted, the remaining members of Akatsuki were meeting. The leader of the shadowy organization spoke first. Although this was uncharacteristic of the leader, not too many people would know it. But the members of Akatsuki did. If the leader was speaking, than something bad had happened.

"As you can see, Itachi and Kisame are not here. That is because they were killed while attempting to capture the two-tailed demon."

This caused a large amount of chatter to break out between partners.

"Also, as you nay notice, Deidara is missing. She failed in her mission to capture the one-tails and was killed by him. Sasori has already moved to replace her, but I fear that time will not allow this. With three of our members dead, and the return of the nine-tailed brat, I believe that we must abandon our earlier plans. If we do not capture him now, than he may grow too powerful and all will be lost, I want the five of you remaining to capture the Kyuubi vessel within the next month. The Jounin exams are coming, and although it would provide the perfect opportunity to take him and the two-tails, we must act swiftly, before he is out of our grasp. As he is now, only the five of you have a hope to take him alive. He has released 4 out of the nine tails, and it only took 3 to kill Kisame and Itachi."

With those instructions, the leader's shadowy figure disappeared, leaving the five remaining members to sort out their plans.

When Naruto entered Sasuke's room Sasuke was shocked to see the blonde boy sporting his newly acquired vest.

"Chunnin now, eh?" Asked the black haired boy.

"Yep, and Baa-chan said she would have made me a jounin, but since the exams are only a few months off, she wants me to take the test." Replied Naruto. "I'm sorry, but this is gonna have to be kinda short, I promised someone I'd meet them in a little bit. So is there anything you nee?"

"No, I'm fine, but I am interested, who are you meeting?" Asked Sasuke.

"Hinata and I are going to train for a while. I told her I'd help her with some stuff." Came Naruto's reply.

Sasuke just smiled as Naruto exited the hospital for the second time that day.

'Maybe you'll finally get it.' He thought

Hinata was waiting at the training field were team seven used to meet. She was waiting for Naruto, but in the mean time, she was occupied with Sakura.

"S-Sakura-san did y-y-you k-know that N-Naruto-kun's birthday is in a week?" The shy girl asked

"WHAT? IT IS?" Obviously Sakura didn't know.

"G-gomen, I thought y-you'd know, s-s-since he is your teammate."

"You don't have to apologize, Hinata, but please, quit calling me 'Sakura-san' it makes me feel old. I wonder why he never told us? Generally you want to celebrate these kinds of things."

"M-maybe it's b-because it's the same day as the festival?" Hinata said, knowing full well why he didn't tell anyone.

"We should throw a party or something, shouldn't we?" Asked Sakura

"Th-that would b-be nice." Responded Hinata. "W-why do-don't you i-invite a-all of his f-fr-friends and I'll h-help you p-pl-plan."

Just then Naruto arrived and all talk of a party vanished. The two girls both noticed Naruto's new chunnin vest and complimented him on his new rank and achievement. Sakura left, making up some excuse about taking Lee out shopping for something that wasn't green spandex.

"Ne, Hinata-chan, how has training with your demon been? I haven't heard anything; I was just hoping it was going fine." Ventured Naruto.

"Oh, i-it's fine Naruto-kun. The Nibi is teaching me a lot about medicine, especially what kinds of plants can be used for what. I've also learned some other stuff, but most of the material is medicine related." She answered.

"That's great, the baka-kitsune doesn't teach me anything, although I don't know were he would find the time, between threatening to kill me and everything I hold dear, and yelling at me." He joked.

The two trained until lunch, when Hinata had to return home, for training with her father. He had taken a new interest in her training, now that she could control the chakra of the nibi. He had lowered his standards a bit, but with the huge amount of chakra, plus a few tips from the swan demon, Hinata was shattering the new and old standards into pieces. Hiashi couldn't have been more proud of his daughter, because she was finally becoming the heiress he knew should would. After the defeat of the Council, a new council had been formed, albeit a weaker one. Now the Hiashi was in control of the destiny of the Hyuuga, and not relying on a group of old senile men. Although there were some who disapproved of the changes, they were in the minority. No one paid any attention to the remaining conservatives, because they welcomed the new Hiashi and more confidant Heiress with open arms, and there was much rejoicing.

Now the aforementioned group of conservatives, who didn't support the new way, were scheming something. Exactly what no one was sure of, and due to their secretive nature, no one even knew that they were scheming anything. But a plan was being hatched as the two demon vessels went on their divergent paths. There was only one part missing, and then they could act.

History books would later show that had the dissenters been more informed on the state of the Hyuuga or had they simply thought of this plan three years earlier, then they might have succeeded. Instead, they attempted to convince Hyuuga Neji, that it would be in his best interest to kill his younger Cousin. Needless to say, the Hyuuga genius declined their offer, and proceeded to beat the members of this group into submission. The greatest part of the fight, wasn't Neji's use of Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou, but the look on the faces of the main house members, when they tried to activate the caged bird seal placed on his forehead. Ironically, the seal had only been removed that morning as a favor to Hinata.

When Hinata entered the compound she found her father and Neji discussing the attempted coup. Training began with a warm-up spar between Hiashi and the two cousins, one at a time. He was very impressed by the two. Where Neji was very powerful he would at times be slightly off center in his strikes. Hinata wasn't as powerful, but she was far more accurate.

Day after day, Hinata would meet Naruto, and then return to train with her family, soon a week had passed, and it was October 10. Hinata and Sakura had found out that the hard part of having a birthday party on the day of a major festival, was getting everyone in one place long enough to hold a decent party. Eventually, they had gotten everyone to agree to a noon party, so that they could have lunch and the party at the same time. Now the problem was getting the birthday boy to come. The original idea had been to have Tsunade summon him under the pretense of a mission, or meeting, but she had slept in late and hadn't had time to send a note. Since Kakashi couldn't be trusted to leave and return in a timely fashion, and Sakura had to finish decorating, the job fell to Hinata.

She had made her ways through the throngs of people celebrating the defeat of the demon and reached Naruto's apartment. Knocking, she waited for the boy to answer.

"Who's there?" He called through the door

"It's me, Naruto-kun." Hinata said but the noise from the festivities drowned out her voice.

"Either you left, or you need to speak up, 'cuz I couldn't hear you." Came Naruto's reply.

"IT'S ME NARUTO-KUN, PLEASE OPEN THE DOOR." The girl yelled over the noise.

Recognizing the voice as Hinata's he cautiously opened the door, and ushered her into the house.

"It's good to see you, Hinata-chan, I don't usually go out today. What do you need?" He asked.

"Hokage-sama wanted you to meet her in her office." She lied.

"Ok, but we'll need to think of a way to get there without me being spotted. People tend to get pissy at me today. I guess they don't like being reminded that what they're celebrating just walked past them." He said rather dejectedly.

A few minutes later, Hinata and Naruto were leaping across roofs in an attempt to reach Tsunade's office. They reached the office without incident and waited to enter. Shizune told them, that Tsunade was meeting with someone, but in reality Sakura was finishing up decorating.

When they were finally allowed to enter, Naruto was met by a collective

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY!"

Looking around the room, all of the Rookie nine and Gai's team were there, along with Konohamaru and his friends, Moegi and Udon. The room was decorated with orange streamers, pinned to the wall with kunai, and there was a large cake with a large swirl design decorating the top. Naruto was actually struck dumb at the site. It was the best birthday party he had ever been to, although he didn't really have anything to compare it to.

Ramen was served for lunch, and it was all Hinata and Tsunade could do to stop an eating contest between Naruto and Choji from breaking out and bankrupting the town. After lunch, Naruto received his many gifts and then the large group dug into the cake. The party lasted an impressive five hours. At six everyone wished Naruto a Happy Birthday one more time before joining the festivities. Except for Naruto, Tsunade and Hinata and Sasuke. The three remaining guests and resident birthday boy cleaned up the office before heading home.

Tracing their exact route from before, Hinata and Naruto returned to the apartment and Naruto invited Hinata in for a while. He placed his mountain of gifts in his room and headed back to Hinata who was sitting in the kitchen, waiting for some water to boil for tea.

"Thank you, Hinata-chan, this was the best birthday ever!" Naruto said, grinning.

"You're welcome, Naruto-kun, it was nothing really." She replied, blushing slightly at the compliment.

'Man is she cute when she blushes.' Naruto thought, bringing a slight blush to his cheeks. 'Maybe I should tell her how I feel. I mean she did throw this party for me, and I really do like her.'

But just as he was about to confess his inner most feelings for the shy girl, the water began to boil and she went to take it off the stove. Over tea, the two talked about different things, from new jutsus to gossip. But after a couple of hours, Hinata had to leave.

"I'm sorry Hinata, I don't think I can walk you home tonight, I'm afraid that the villagers might take out their frustrations on you." Naruto said.

"No, it's okay Naruto-kun, I understand. Besides it's not that late yet, so I'll be fine."

He walked her to the door, and suddenly pulled her into a hug, thanking her for the party. The shy girl blushed a furious shade of red at the close contact and stammered a "You're welcome" back. As she left and disappeared into the night, two people thought the same thing at the same time.

'Damn it, I couldn't tell him/her how I feel.'


	6. Chapter 6

The day following Naruto's birthday, was a dreary one. The rain was coming down so hard that all non-essential missions and operations in the village were canceled. As such, the former members of the 'rookie nine' had the day off. Naruto went to visit Sasuke, since the Uchiha genius couldn't do much, and the majority of the group simply went home to rest. Ino and Sakura had dragged Hinata into Ino's house, since they had to meet in the Hokage's office, and the Hyuuga estate was a long distance from the office. There they locked themselves in Ino's room and began questioning Hinata about here whereabouts after the party yesterday.

"So, Hinata, Tsunade-sensai told me that you and Naruto went to his apartment after the party. What did you two do?" Sakura asked.

"N-no-nothing m-much," Hinata stammered "We w-went back and had s-some t-tea and talked about s-some t-things."

"Oh, like what kind of things?" Asked Ino, sweetly.

"W-well, we t-talked about t-tr-training and t-that was a-about it. H-he thanked m-me for the party though." Hinata answered.

"Oh and how did he thank you?" Asked Sakura with an evil look in her eye that said 'I know, but I'm gonna torture you until you tell us anyways'.

"W-well, h-he hugged me." She said, so quietly that no one heard her.

"What was that Hinata, I couldn't hear you, speak up." Said Sakura.

"He h-hugged me." The shy girl answered, blushing.

As the other two girls continued to press for information, Hinata eventually opened up a little bit.

"Hey, Hinata I heard some rumors that your father attacked the Hyuuga council the night before we left to get Sasuke back, is that true?" Asked Sakura.

"H-hai, although I c-can't tell you w-why, b-because it is a Hyuuga m-matter." She replied.

As the three girls were talking and gossiping in Ino's house, Tsunade was doing paperwork. Normally she would have been very angry, but this was interesting. It was the autopsy report of Uchiha Itachi.

_The body of Uchiha Itachi is in such a condition that it is hardly recognizable. There is a hole in his left side and another in his back. The hole on his side is clean through his body, however the attack to his back is deep, but not entirely through. There is also a hole in his chest from a chidori. Between these attacks and the use of his life as seal fortification for the Fuuja Houin, it is impossible to determine the fatal attack. _

_**Note:** The body contains what appears to be a version of the Hyuuga Bunke Juinjutsu. Upon his death, the sharingan ability has sealed itself up. His body sports the ANBU tattoo as well as another one. The final tattoo appears to be a perfect copy of the seal used to imprison the Kyuubi inside of Uzumaki Naruto. _

_**Personal Articles:** Aside from the clothing, the body contained only two personal affects. Both are scrolls, one is addressed to the Hokage, and the other is addressed to Uchiha Sasuke. Both are enclosed with the report._

It was then that Tsunade shifted her attention to the two scrolls, spattered with blood. She took the one addressed to her, and began to read. Inside was a description of the Akatsuki's plans and why they are interested in the vessels of the tailed beasts. What she read was not in the least bit good.

Hyuuga Hiashi was meeting with the new council. He found the new council much more willing to implement change than the old one, and was grateful for it. As the discussion on the last item ended, Hiashi moved to end the meeting; however, the head of the new council spoke up.

"Hiashi-sama, we have one last order of business for the day and it concerns your daughter. As you know, 16 is considered the legal age for marriage here and before you get the idea that we are trying to marry her off, please hear us out. In light of her new found power, we do not think that it would be safe for her to stop her instruction, but we wish for the clan to at least have its future secure, at least in all outward appearances. What we ask, is that by Hinata-sama's seventeenth birthday, she have a fiancée. We will not force her to marry anyone she doesn't want to, nor will we set a day for her marriage. All that we ask is that she marry someone from Konoha, and be engaged by her seventeenth birthday."

Hiashi thought about what the council was proposing. It wasn't entirely unreasonable; actually, it was very reasonable.

"I will agree with only one additional term to be considered. If Hinata is considering, who I think she is, than he will not wish to marry into the family. I wish to make the marriage so that Hinata will still be the head, but that her Husband isn't forced to take the Hyuuga name. Other than that stipulation, I find nothing wrong in your request." He stated.

"Very well, I don't think there is anything wrong with that stipulation Hiashi-sama; we will allow you to inform your daughter of the council's decision at your leisure." Replied the council head.

"I have but one additional question regarding this topic" Hiashi asked "will this become Hyuuga tradition, or is it simply in the case of my daughter and possibly future clan heads?"

"We have not yet decided on any long-term plans yet. After we see the results of this we will make our decision."

With that, the meeting was adjourned, and Hiashi returned to his study to attend to other matters.

When Hinata returned that night Hiashi took her aside to discuss her future.

"What d-did you wish to t-talk a-about Otou-san?" Hinata asked.

"The council and I have reached a decision regarding the future of the clan today, and it involves you. Under the old council, you would have been married off in a few months as a political move. The new council has decided that you would benefit most from staying here and training for a time. Under the agreement, you must have a fiancée by your seventeenth birthday, however it can be anyone of your choice, and you do not have to be married until you are ready, also, this boy must be a citizen of Konoha."

Hinata was shocked at the news, but she was also pleased. The council wasn't trying to rule her life, and all they were asking, was that she have a fiancée in a little over a year. Plus, it could be anyone, that included Naruto, but one thing crossed her mind.

"Ano, f-father, I know it is custom for s-someone m-marrying into the clan t-to t-take the Hyuuga name, b-but I d-don't know, if the p-pe-person that I'm thinking o-of w-will l-like that." She said.

Hiashi's face softened a bit, seeing how thoughtful his daughter could be.

"I have dealt with that. Should your future husband not wish to take our name, he doesn't have to, and you will still remain head of the clan." He stated.

Hinata's eyes widened in surprise and happiness.

"R-really? Arigatou Otou-san!" She exclaimed.

"It's the least I could do for my daughter." He said smiling. "Now why don't you get some sleep, you'll have a tough day tomorrow." He said.

Hinata simply smiled and bowed as she exited. As she drifted off to sleep her mind kept playing images of her and Naruto doing different things, eating together, going out, and finally getting married. She fell asleep grinning.

Naruto was walking back to his apartment. He had just polished off twelve bowls of ramen at Ichiraku's and was feeling particularly happy. He kept seeing Hinata in his mind; it was like a movie, visions of Hinata smiling or blushing, or both. 'I don't know how I could have missed her before, she's so beautiful' he thought. 'She's smart, and quick, and strong, plus she has those eyes. They look like pearls, or ivory, or…I don't know, but they're damn pretty! I think tomorrow I should take her out for lunch, and tell her how I feel, I hope she understands.' As he entered his apartment and readied for bed he made a promise that tomorrow he would tell Hinata that he loved her. And Naruto never goes back on a promise.

The next day came with much better weather than the previous one. The sun shone brightly only occasionally being covered by a stray cloud as Naruto and Hinata met to train. As usual Hinata arrived earlier than her training partner. When Naruto arrived five minutes later and panting heavily, he saw Hinata practicing her Jyuuken with a training log. She seemed to be deeply in thought.

"Hey Hinata-chan, how are you?" He asked innocently, trying to see what she was thinking about.

"Ohayo, Naruto-kun, I'm fine, I'm just thinking about something my father told me yesterday."

"Oh, alright then, how about we spar a bit to warm up?" The blonde asked.

Hinata adopted a combative stance and waited for Naruto to make the first move. He didn't disappoint, charging directly towards her, right fist drawn back. She saw his attack easily and ducked to her right, in an attempt to land a strike to his side, but as her hand reached out, Naruto disappeared in a flash of yellow. Since her attack hit nothing, Hinata was thrown off balance. As she fell forward, Naruto re-appeared in another flash, and caught her.

"You okay, Hinata-chan?" He asked as he righted her into a standing position.

"Hai, I'm fine, but what was that technique that you used?" She asked

"Oh, that's the shunshin or body flicker. It's the move that I used to beat fish-face." He said.

"But I thought the Kyuubi was controlling you when you did that, so how can you do it?" She asked in a perplexed tone of voice.

"You know, I'm not sure, but I think it might be because of my ability."

"Do you mean like a bloodline?" Hinata asked, interrupting.

"Well, I wouldn't say that, mostly because I don't know my family, but whenever my body does a jutsu correctly, I can perform that jutsu perfectly again, without practicing. As far as I know, no one has ever been able to do that before, so I call it my ability." He explained.

"Oh, I see. You might be right, whenever I lean a new jutsu, it takes a long time for me to do it once correctly, and then I still have troubles with it sometimes." She replied grinning.

They continued their practice for a while longer, until Naruto suggested that they stop and go for lunch.

"Neh, Hinata-chan, where would you like to go for lunch?" Naruto asked.

"I don't know, what would you like?" She asked

"Well, I could go for some ramen right now, but what ever you would like would be fine."

"I know, you go get some ramen, and I'll go to the dango shop across from Ichiraku and then we could go eat in the park." Hinata suggested.

With their lunch plans decided, the two teenagers left to pick up their food and headed towards one of the parks in the village. As they sat and ate, Naruto's stomach was inverting itself rapidly despite having a good amount of ramen in it. 'What if she doesn't like me?' he thought. 'Maybe things will get really weird and we might stop being friends. Oh hell, there's no time like the present so just do it already!' he mentally screamed at himself.

"H-Hinata-chan, um can I um tell you something?" He stammered, scratching his neck.

"Sure Naruto-kun, you can tell me anything." Replied the quiet girl.

'Please don't hate me, please don't hate me!' he thought "Well, I don't really know how to say this, so I'm gonna be kinda blunt, um Hinata-chan I…I…I think that…that…Iloveyou!" He blurted out very quickly.

Hinata almost choked, fainted and cried when she heard Naruto's admission. Her body chose the fainting option. As Naruto caught her, and laid her down on the ground he was worried she had choked.

"Hinata-chan, Hinata-chan are you okay!" he yelled at the unconscious girl.

As he was panicking, Hinata regained consciousness in time to prevent him from running to get the Hokage.

"I'm fine Naruto-kun, it's just that…I…I think I love you too." She said her voice getting quieter after each word.

Now it was Naruto's turn to almost faint. Instead, he simply fell to the ground in shock.

"R…really?" He squeaked out.

"Hai, aishiteru Naruto-kun." She said, meekly.

He just pulled her into a hug and tried to hold back tears of joy. Although Hinata was a bit surprised at the sudden contact, she quickly returned the affection, burying her head in his chest. After a minute or so, they broke the embrace, a red tint to both of their cheeks. Hinata had to return to the Hyuuga estate for training, but the two agreed to go out that night to talk some more. As he watched the one he loves disappear into the distance, Naruto's only thought was

'I'm lucky to have found someone like her.'


	7. Chapter 7

Sasuke looked at the scroll he held in his hands. It was addressed to him, in his older brother's hand writing. He almost didn't want to read it, but some part of him forced him to open it up, and begin to read it.

_Sasuke,_

_If you are reading this, than congratulations, it means that you've finally killed me. I don't know why I'm doing this, maybe out of habit, or maybe I feel the need to explain my actions more fully. What I told you all those years ago was no lie. I killed our clan to test my strength, at the time that was all I cared about. I saw what I had become, and to some extent I loathed it. I was the greatest shinobi of my generation, I had gained everything I could have wanted, yet something was missing. As time passed on, I saw you train yourself so that you could kill me, it brought me a kind of ease, knowing that you lived, solely for revenge, and that one day, you might actually be able to kill me. After a while, especially after your graduation, I devised a new reason for you to live. I wished to pit my ideals against yours. I watched, as you grew closer to your teacher, and teammates and I saw that, slowly, your façade began to crack and chip. You started to see yourself as part of a family. That is why I wished you to kill me, in a way I wished to be proven wrong. I wanted to pit the strength of your 'family' against the might of the Uchiha clan. Sadly, it seems that I may have pushed you too far, when you defected to Orochimaru, I was disappointed in you, for while I hold no attachment to our clan, I do hold some allegiance to Konoha, despite my status as its most infamous missing-nin. Due to my loyalty, I couldn't let the sharingan fall into the snake's hands. The information, that you no doubt received, stating that I was near Konoha, was actually a trap to lure you away from Orochimaru, so that he wouldn't be able to posses your body. I know of your previous goals, to kill me and revive the Uchiha clan, however, I want you to think about life with the clan. Yes, there were parents, and you were happy, but was there love? I didn't think so, I still don't think so. That is why I don't want you to revive the Uchiha clan. I want you to start your own family, and find love, I don't wish for another clan that only values its members only for how strong they become. I want you to have a real family, that you love, and they love you back. I hope that you will consider this as my final wish, and grant it accordingly._

_Uchiha Itachi_

As Sasuke read over his brother's final request, he was able to gain a small amount of insight into the inner workings of his deranged brother's mind. He found a large amount of truth in the final request of his brother as well. 'I always felt as though Father loved Itachi more than me, and Mom wasbetter, but Itachi was right, I felt no love from them as a clan. Maybe…maybe he's right about this family thing.' Sasuke lost himself in contemplation over the scroll as night descended onto Konoha.

While Sasuke was coming to terms with his brother, Tsunade was looking over her own scroll. Itachi's words troubled her, it seemed as though he was loyal to the leaf still. He had outlined the workings of Akatsuki, and told them how the remaining members would react to his death. All of is information seemed credible, it had confirmed what Jiraiya already knew, and then some. Although privy to many secrets of the organization, Itachi didn't know the identity of its leader, or why they wanted the demon vessels. He had specifically gone over the procedure each member was to follow in the event of a successful capture. If the vessel was cooperative, they would be allowed entrance to the organization, so that they could use its great power. If the vessel didn't want to join, then a special process was implemented. It was a two step process. First, the soul of the demon was extracted from the host as well as the host's own soul. The demon would be carefully sealed into a member of the organization. That is why each member carried a tattoo copy of the seal that corresponded to which demon, they were to control. Itachi was to have the Kyuubi transferred to him, while Kisame was granted the Nibi, and a Stone-nin was given the Shukaku. While sealing a demon with the amount of power that the nine different tailed-beasts have would normally kill an adult, the members of the Akatsuki were different. Each member had a trait that would allow them to house the demons without dying. It wasn't explained how though, and that left a few questions in Tsunade's mind. And so, a very confused Hokage once again read over the scroll in her possession, trying to make sense of it.

Hiashi was greatly impressed with Hinata's improvement. He stared his daughter over, checking her form and posture. Everything was correct. He nodded in approval and called for a break.

"You did very well today, Hinata, I'd say it'll only take you a month or so to master the 'Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou'."

"Thank you very much." Was all she could say. She had recently quit stuttering around her father, but speaking with any kind of volume was still hard.

"I noticed that you were thinking a lot today, did something happen?" Hiashi asked.

"Hai, um Naruto-kun…asked me to go out tonight." She replied, blushing.

Hiashi was happy for his daughter. She had finally gained the attention of the one she loved.

"Very well, when will he be meeting you?" He asked, going from instructor to father mode very quickly.

"Ano, I'm not sure, we never set a time." Hinata replied realizing that her first official date with Naruto might not happen if he didn't remember to come.

"Well, whenever you two leave, please be back by eleven. Now, if you weren't planning on having dinner, perhaps we should join Hanabi." Hiashi replied smiling.

The aforementioned blonde was currently showering and cleaning himself up for his date tonight.

'I wish I had something other than my usual outfit to wear.' He thought. While the black and orange shirt and black pants were good for missions, he wished he had something a little nicer, should he have to meet Hiashi.'

He continued to ready himself for the night until a stray though crossed his mind.

'Oh crap! I didn't say what time I was going to meet Hinata-chan!' With that, Uzumaki Naruto franticly finished getting dressed, and ran towards the Hyuuga compound.

Hinata had just finished dinner and was getting ready for her date, when Naruto arrived at the Hyuuga compound. She quickly put on a Chinese style silk shirt, colored lavender, and some black pants. Quickly brushing her hair, she hurried towards Naruto, who was waiting for her, outside the main building.

"Ohayo, Hinata-chan!" He greeted her, when she came into view.

"Ohayo, Naruto-kun." She replied.

"Um, well, this is the first time, that I've been on a date before," he said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head "so I don't really know, what to do, is there something that you'd like to do Hinata-chan?"

"I already ate dinner, but…well; we could get some ice cream." The shy girl suggested.

"Okay!" Naruto yelled "Ice cream it is. Oh, by the way, you look very pretty tonight." He added, blushing a deep red.

"T-thank you, Naruto-kun." Replied Hinata. 'He thinks I look pretty!' He mentally squealed.

As the two made their way towards the closest ice cream store, they passed a shop, where Ino and Sakura were shopping.

"Was that Naruto and Hinata?" Asked Sakura. "Together. Was she dressed up? Do you think that…? ARE THEY ON A DATE?"

All Ino could do was blink at the two, and then try to calm Sakura down

The two teenagers bought their ice cream, and headed to the park to eat in relative peace.

"Ne, Hinata-chan, how is training with you father going?" Naruto asked, between bites of his ice cream.

"It's going fine, he started to teach me Hakkeshou: Rokujuu Yonshou and he thinks I'll be able to master it in about a month, but I don't know if it'll be good enough." She stated, reverting to timid Hinata.

"Don't say that, I'm sure it'll be great." Naruto comforted her.

Hinata's face suddenly hardened with resolve. "You're right, Naruto-kun, I just need to practice, and I'll learn to perform it with out any problems."

"Exactly!" Naruto replied. "You just need to practice it, and with your hard work, I'm sure you'll do fine."

They finished their dessert, and continued to walk around until it was time for Hinata to return home. Naruto accompanied her to the front of her house.

"Naruto-kun, I… I had a great time tonight." Hinata said, very softly.

"Thanks, so did I, um would you like to go out for dinner tomorrow night?" He asked nervously.

"I'd love to!" Hinata exclaimed rather loudly, eliciting a blush from the shy girl as she clasped her hands over her mouth.

"Ok, great, how about I pick you up around seven, or actually, when do you finish training with your father?" He asked.

"Seven o'clock would be fine." She replied.

"All right, then I'll pick you up at seven." He repeated. "Well, I should go now, have a good night, Hinata-chan."

"Good night, Naruto-kun." She replied "Thank you for the evening."

"It was nothing." Naruto said, scratching the back of his head nervously.

As he was about to leave, Hinata managed to muster enough courage to grab his arm and…kiss him on the right side of his face. Naruto stopped in his tracks. Hinata had just kissed him, and it was the first kiss he had ever received in his life. Hinata turned a violent shade of red, and simply said "Good-night" before entering the grounds to her house. For the next few minutes, Naruto stood rooted to the ground. He was in a deep state of shock after what had just transpired. He then began to walk towards his apartment in a kind of daze. He didn't notice that there was someone in front of him until he almost bumped into them.

"Sorry" he muttered, as he moved to the right of the road.

"Uzumaki Naruto" replied the figure "I wish to speak with you."

Naruto looked up and almost fainted, when he realized that he almost walked into the patriarch of the Hyuuga family, Hiashi. He nodded his head and followed Hiashi to his office inside the Hyuuga compound.

"I understand that you went on a date with my daughter tonight." Hiashi stated in a neutral tone of voice.

"Y-yes sir, we went out for ice cream and a walk around the village." Naruto replied, barely making eye contact.

Hiashi stared the boy over for a minute before asking his next question.

"Tell me, do you care for my daughter?" He asked rather bluntly.

Naruto's body jerked a slight bit at the question before he answered "Hai, Hyuuga-sama, I care for her a lot."

Hiashi once again stared him down before continuing.

"Why is that?" He asked plainly.

Naruto thought a moment, going through all of the reasons why he loved Hinata in his head.

"Well, for one, she's very nice, and she's always caring for others, rather than herself. Plus, she's smart and is very good with medical things. She's always there for you whenever someone needs something, and she's loyal to a fault." He was about to continue, when Hiashi cut him off.

"That's enough. I have something I wish to tell you. It was decided a couple of days ago, that Hinata needed to have a fiancée by her seventeenth birthday. I know for a fact that my daughter cares for you enough that if she had the strength of will, she would have asked you to marry her today. I don't wish to force you to do anything that you don't want to, but if you care about Hinata as much as you say, than you will reach your own conclusion, about your future." Hiashi said.

"Wait, you're saying that you want me to marry Hinata?" Naruto asked slightly confused. He was sure, Hiashi was about to kill him, for kissing his daughter.

"What I'm saying, is that Hinata loves you, and that she must be engaged in a years time. To whom, is up to her. I want you to spend more time with Hinata, and if in a year, you realize that you love her, than it would honor me, if you would become engaged to Hinata." Hiashi said.

"Wait, you'd be honored? I thought that the Hyuuga didn't like people like me?" Naruto said, getting more confused by the minute.

"In times past, yes, you would have been forbidden from seeing my daughter, let alone marrying her. However, there is a new council, and they wish that she marry some man of her choice. She obviously chooses you, but won't say it because of her nature. I would indeed be honored, to have you as a son in law because you bring out the best in her. You are her inspiration, and if she were to marry you, than she would undoubtedly become a great leader of the clan. I just wished for you to know about the decree by the council.

Naruto was dumbstruck. He didn't know what to say, he had just received permission from Hyuuga Hiashi to court his oldest daughter. He was, for the second time that night, in shock. He asked to be excused and headed towards his apartment.

'Hinata-chan has to be engaged by her seventeenth birthday, and Hiashi would be honored, if I were her fiancée. This is just weird. I do love Hinata, I really do, but…ARGGH, there shouldn't be any buts, I love her, she loves me. What's so hard about this?' He thought. Suddenly a thought from the back of his mind popped into the foreground. 'I…I'm afraid. I'm afraid that this is too good to be true, that maybe I don't really love her, and it's just some kind of crush. NO! I'm sure that I love her; I never felt this way with Sakura-chan, or anyone for that matter. I mean, we have a year, if things don't work out, than we'll know, and than she'll be engaged to somebody else.' He finished his thought on that depressing note. He walked towards his apartment door, and searched his pockets for his keys. As he unlocked his door, he once again became lost in thought. It wasn't until he closed the door, that he realized something was wrong. Feeling a small amount of chakra behind him, he spun around to find an exploding note burning itself out. As the note exploded in his face, he noticed that there was a pair of figures in his apartment. As he lost consciousness, he realized, with a tinge of horror, that they wore black cloaks with red clouds on them.

(A/N: Wow, this is the first one of these I've done, so I'd just like to thank everyone that has reviewed this story, and everyone who's put it on their favorite's list or their alert list. Please keep reading and please review some more. Any suggestions as to how this, or anything I might write in the future, will help immensely. Thank you and I hope to keep updating every weekend.)


	8. Chapter 8

After reading the scroll from his brother, Sasuke returned to his training. Now that he was free of the cursed seal, he wanted to know exactly how strong he was. The words of the Godaime echoed through his head.

_**Flashback**_

"_Sasuke," Tsunade said to the surviving Uchiha, "I know that you've been training these past years to become stronger, and then Naruto and Lee both were able to push you to the second level of the cursed seal. I know that this doesn't make any sense, but I'm pretty sure, that you're on par with, if not slightly above Lee. When you were using the seal, it seemed like you had infinite amounts of chakra, but instead you were receiving the same amount that you were receiving when you first got it. The seal didn't grow in strength with you, and when you used it, you actually were limited to the power of the seal. So when you fought Naruto you were actually weaker than you probably should have been."_

_**End Flashback**_

Sasuke did indeed find that piece of information interesting. So he poured himself into the training he was allowed to do in his suspended status. This mostly was limited to taijutsu and chakra control, but he found that Tsunade's words rung true. He was stronger without the seal, than with it. The only thing it gave him was a small boost in speed, which he was quickly able to replicate with a combination of weights and chakra. As he became more engrossed in his workout, he began to replay the conversations he had with his old friends.

_**Flashback**_

_Sasuke hated the silence that permeated the room. For the first time that he could remember, (and he could remember quit a bit) Sakura wasn't talking to him. She wasn't pestering him for a date, or asking about his different preferences, or anything. She was just sitting in his kitchen, across the table from him, not saying anything. Once or twice she had opened her mouth, only to close it a second later without speaking. He thought it might be better if he spoke first._

"_Sakura…I'm sorry. For that night, when I knocked you out. I don't really know what happened to me."_

_He was looking for something else to say to show his sorrow for his past atrocities, but Sakura interrupted his thought process._

"_It's ok, Sasuke, I forgave you a long time ago. I heard that the seal was doing something to you, so I can't really hold that against you." She stated, before falling silent again._

_Once again, an awkward silence filled the room as the two teenagers sat across from each other, not saying a word._

_**End Flashback**_

Eventually the conversation grew lighter, covering topics from the village to Sakura's training and her relationship with Lee. By the end of the conversation she had informed him that she would consider him a friend again. When he asked if she thought the others would react negatively she gave an answer much like Naruto's. She calmly explained that if Naruto had forgiven him, than Hinata would too. After a while Neji would probably forgive him, although it would take a while. This would in-turn lead to Lee and maybe TenTen forgiving him as well. The ones most likely to hold a grudge against him for his defection would probably be Kiba. Shikamaru, she joked, would find hatred 'far too troublesome' and Chouji would probably mimic his friend. Hearing about the Ino-Shika-Cho member's brought back more of Naruto's words.

"_Hey, does Ino still have that crush on me?" he asked, hoping that she didn't. He just couldn't stand her._

"_Ino? No, actually she moved on rather quickly after you left. We all suspected that she was seeing Shikamaru, but she wasn't. It was quit the mystery for a while, but then we found out she had been dating Kankuro, Gaara's brother, or should I say the Kazekage's brother." She stated. _

"_I'd heard that Gaara became the Kazekage when they returned back, but Ino and Kankuro, wasn't he the one that wore make-up and had a hood with cat ears on it?" Sasuke asked in a mocking manner._

"_Hai, that's Kankuro. Actually, they didn't start seeing each other, until Temari started to date Shikamaru. Now that political relations are a little better between the two countries, Temari and Kankuro have become the Suna ambassadors to Konoha." She finished._

As he replayed the dialogue in his mind, Sasuke was overcome with a wave of happiness. He knew that hopefully in a little while, all the people he had hurt, either psychologically, or physically would forgive him. He just needed to work at it. He was also quit pleased with his reassessment of his skills. He figured he was probably an elite Chunnin, if not border-line Jounin.

'I may not be able to surpass you, Naruto,' Sasuke thought 'but there's no shame in being second best.'

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Now, an exploding note does not require a lot of chakra to activate it, thus making it perfect for sneak attacks. The best notes are said to require nothing more than the will of the maker to activate. As such none of the shinobi in the village were aware that Naruto had just been rendered unconscious by an exploding note of high quality. While the chakra signature might be low, the explosion itself would have been heard by anyone living in the apartment complex. However, since 'the demon' was living there, the only person who heard the explosion was the landlord. The old man held much against the Kyuubi, and it surprised many people when he agreed to the Sandaime's request to house the boy. What most people don't know was that he charged the third Hokage an exorbitant amount of money for the shabby room, enough to recuperate his losses. If the grey haired man had been anywhere else in the building, he wouldn't have caught up to the two Akatsuki members, leaving with the unconscious form of Uzumaki Naruto.

"Are you two going to kill that brat?" he asked to the backs of the figures.

The two cloaked forms turned to survey the aging man.

"The boy will die when we are through with him." One said.

"Hn. It's about time; damn demon has caused enough trouble around here. Just make sure you get the job done. I'll keep that bitch of a Hokage off your trail for a while." The decrepit landlord said as he turned around and walked off.

The two members just leapt away from the village quickly trying to make it back to the Akatsuki base.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The next morning came to Konoha bright and sunny. There wasn't anything wrong in the village, and everyone was happy. Except for Hinata. You see, Naruto was twenty minutes late for their morning practice, and Hinata was growing impatient. She had even activated her byakugan attempting to catch an image of a blonde haired shinobi running towards her. After another twenty minutes, Hinata grew quit irate about her boyfriends tardiness.

'Since he isn't here, I'll go look for him. Maybe he got a mission.' She thought.

The first place she went to look was Ichiraku Ramen. She didn't see him, and moved on to her second choice of location. She took a leisurely walk through the village towards the training field were Team 7 first became rookie gennin. This was a very special place for Naruto, and she thought he might be there. But alas, he wasn't there either. She retraced her steps and headed towards the Hokage's office.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

While Hinata was searching for Naruto, two other figures were searching for the loud ninja as well. Well, one was looking; the other was peeking at women while they bathed. Hatake Kakashi was searching for Naruto on orders from the Hokage. The first place he looked was the training field where his former student and Hyuuga Hinata often practiced. Upon finding neither of teens present, he too went off in search of the blonde boy. Thinking along the same lines as Hinata he went to Ichiraku's. He didn't see the boy there, and continued towards the boy's apartment. When he got there, he noticed that the door was damaged, and that no one was in the apartment. He then proceeded to search out the land lord.

"Excuse me sir, but have you seen Uzumaki Naruto around recently, I'm to have him report to the Hokage immediately." He asked politely.

"No, Hatake-san, I haven't seen the boy since yesterday afternoon." Lied the old man.

Surprisingly, Kakashi couldn't get any kind of read on the old man. "Did you know that his door was burned or damaged recently?" Kakashi asked.

"No, although it doesn't surprise me, damn kid can't take care of his exploding notes, and damages my property." The man replied angrily, lying once again.

"Well, thank you for your time." Kakashi said as he left. 'Something just doesn't feel right. Naruto has never shown an interest in using explosive notes, come to think of it, I'm not even sure he could afford it, if he did want to use them.'

As he walked through town again, he passed Ichiraku again. This time, he went inside and asked the owner if he had seen Naruto.

"Actually, I haven't seen him today." Replied the owner. "That actually worries me. He's been coming here non-stop since he returned. This is the first time, he missed any sort of a meal here."

Now that was not good news. Kakashi knew that Naruto would have ramen if it killed him. So the only possible explanation was that either Naruto was changing his eating habits, which was highly unlikely, or something had happened to him. Kakashi made a mad dash towards the Hokage's office.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Shizune looked up from her desk when she felt someone enter the waiting room for the Hokage.

"Ah, Hinata-san, what can I do for you?" She asked.

"A-ano, um I w-was wondering i-if Naruto-k-kun had a mission t-today?" Asked the stuttering girl.

"Well, not that I know of, but if you wait a minute, the Hokage will be done with a meeting, and you could ask her. But, why do you want to know?" Shizune replied.

W-well, he didn't s-sh-show up for pr-practice today and h-he wasn't at Ic-Ichiraku's, and I already checked h-his o-other training grounds. H-he's not anywhere." Hinata said quietly.

Just then Tsunade exited her office to speak with Shizune. Shizune whispered something in Tsunade's ear, and the Hokage stiffened slightly.

"I'm sorry Hinata, but I didn't assign Naruto to any mission today, I don't know where he could be." Tsunade replied.

As the shy heiress was about to reply a noticeably panting, grey-haired Jounin entered the room.

"Hokage-sama, we have…a problem. Naruto wasn't at his house or at Ichiraku. His apartment shows signs that something happened, but the landlord wouldn't say. Something needs to be done fast!" Kakashi reported, while gasping for air.

A look of confusion, panic and terror crossed the faces of all those present. Somehow, Uzumaki Naruto had gone missing.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

At the same time that the Hokage was discussing the disappearance of Naruto, the two members of Akatsuki that were sporting his body returned to the base. Placing his body in the middle of a complex sealing circle, they began to remove the soul of the Kyuubi from Naruto's body.

**(A/N: Um thanks for the reviews, I'm sorry that this chapter was a little short, I wanted to write more, but I just couldn't think of anything to write. I promise the next chapter will be longer, and depending on the circumstances, may or may not be out earlier than next weekend. Unit then please keep reviewing, and if anyone knows how to separate paragraphs in a word document and have it transfer over to could you please tell me? Thanks to the reviews and for all the people that read my story.)**


	9. Chapter 9

Four forms raced towards the apartment building that was home to Uzumaki Naruto. The Godaime Hokage, Tsunade, Hatake Kakashi, Shizune, and Hyuuga Hinata were running as fast as was possible to investigate Kakashi's claim that Naruto had been abducted or was missing. As they ran over roof tops, they felt a large spike in chakra and killer intent coming from the direction of the building. Pushing more chakra into their legs, the four increased their speed towards the building.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

Sasuke had been in a good mood. He had re-assed his skills and found them to be much better now, than when he had used the cursed seal. After his training, he had showered and made his way into town, hoping to cross paths with a certain blonde shinobi. He had even gone to the lengths of staking out Naruto's favorite restaurant just in case the loudmouth had gone for food. But after a few hours, it seemed that Naruto wasn't coming to Ichiraku's. He had seen both Hinata and Kakashi pass by, and had overheard Kakashi's conversation with the owner. When he heard that Naruto hadn't shown up that morning, he moved towards the blonde's apartment at a quick pace. He had noticed the door, and saw that it appeared to be burned, or charred. Now, the Uchiha clan is known for their mastery of all types of katon jutsu's, and Sasuke could attest that the burning was definitely not any type of jutsu he knew. He was leaving the building when he walked past a door three doors down from Naruto's and heard an old voice talking happily to someone.

"…so I asked 'em if they were going to kill the bastard, and they says yeah. So I just let 'em go on their way. I don't know why any one would miss the son of a bitch, but a shinobi came by this morning looking for the demon. I told 'im that I 'hadn't seen him and he left."

When Sasuke heard this, he flew off the proverbial handle-bars. He kicked down the door, finding the old landlord talking with an equally old man, sharing some sake. Sasuke had his sharingan active, looking very foreboding with shadows from the door frame obscuring his face. Instinctively chakra began to flow to his right hand, and condensed until it became the chidori. He quickly moved forward and deftly grabbed the old man by his shirt and lifted him into the air.

"Where is he?" Sasuke yelled. "Where is Naruto?"

Just then, the group of four arrived to find Sasuke threatening the life of the old landlord. Kakashi quickly moved forward to stop Sasuke from breaking the terms of his probation.

"Uchiha Sasuke, put the man down NOW!" Instructed Tsunade.

"Hokage-sama, he let someone leave with Naruto!" Sasuke argued, his eyes still fixed on the now shaking man in his grasp.

"WHAT?" Everyone yelled, this included the usually reserved Hinata. Shizune turned and looked at the shy girl with a questioning look, but diverted her attention back to the quaking form that was Naruto's landlord.

"I heard him talking about letting someone take Naruto and he just let them leave!" Sasuke yelled. The only thing that was keeping him from plunging the chidori in his hand into the old man's neck was Kakashi's arm on his elbow.

"Kakashi, take him to Ibiki, I want to know exactly what happened to Naruto, fast! Sasuke, everyone else, come with me." Tsunade directed.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

After the group returned to Tsunade's office, they had to wait for Ibiki's report. However, that didn't stop the Hokage from questioning the last surviving Uchiha.

"Sasuke, what exactly lead you to believe that he let people abduct Naruto?" She questioned, trying to contain her temper at the situation.

Sasuke was trying to calm down enough to answer her. When he regained his composure, he looked right at Hinata and said:

"I'm sorry Hokage-sama, but I don't think Naruto would appreciate me telling, you see it involves his…secret."

"What the Kyuubi?" Asked Hinata in a semi-hysterical manner.

"You know?" Sasuke asked.

"Yes, Sasuke, she know, but what did you hear?" Tsunade asked.

"He said that he let someone leave with that 'bastard' and that no one would miss the 'demon'." Sasuke said, seething.

At this point, Tsunade, Shizune, and Hinata were about to go give the old man a piece of their mind for harming their little brother, or boyfriend, respectively. But, lo, a savoir by the name of Kakashi came bearing his report.

"Tsunade-sama, what Sasuke said was true, the landlord allowed two ninja to walk off the property with an unconscious Naruto last night around mid-night."

"SHIT!" exclaimed the blonde hokage. "Shizune, get the ANBU, tell them to search for Naruto!"

"I'm sorry Hokage-sama, but there is more. It would seem that these two are members of Akatsuki." Kakashi interrupted.

At this everyone, save Sasuke's face paled.

"What does my brother's old organization have to do with Naruto?" Inquired the black haired genius.

"The Akatsuki are after the nine biju or tailed demons." Tsunade explained. "Shizune, scratch the ANBU, were going after him ourselves. I want Nara Shikamaru here in ten minutes, and I also want Gai, plus anyone else you can convince. I'm bringing my little brother back, if it kills me!"

Shizune went to gather Shikamaru, and Kakashi left in a puff of smoke to fetch Gai.

"Sasuke, I'm revoking your suspension to help us in our retrieval. We are going to need all the help we can get."

Sasuke nodded, and was about to leave to gather his equipment when Hinata spoke up.

"Hokage-sama, I'm going as well." She said in an unwavering voice.

"Hinata, I'm afraid that I can't allow that, due to your…condition." The hokage delicately said.

Hinata was about to yell that she didn't care, and would gladly risk the nibi, for Naruto, but was interrupted prematurely by a bird with a message attached to it's leg. Tsunade took the message and read it, eyes growing larger with every word she read. When she finished she addressed the two remaining chunnin.

"Hinata scratch that order, you and Sasuke have four minutes to gather all of your equipment and be back here. I would seem that the Kazekage has done something rather rash.

The two just nodded in acknowledgment and left in a burst of speed out the window.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

Exactly four minutes after the two teenagers left, they returned, extremely winded and gasping for breath. As they were recuperating, Shizune entered with Shikamaru and Shino, who had apparently been playing shogi with the lazy genius. They were only waiting for Kakashi to return with Gai, all parties that knew of the urgency of the situation hoped for once that Kakashi wouldn't be two hours late. Thankfully all fears were slaughtered mercilessly when the grey haired Jounin arrived with Gai, Rock Lee, and Jiraiya in tow.

"All right, now that everyone is here, I have some really shitty news." Tsunade began. "Last night, Uzumaki Naruto was abducted by the organization Akatsuki around midnight. Thanks to a treasonous old bastard of a landlord, they were allowed to walk away with Naruto and no one was aware of anything until around noon today. That means that he's been missing for a little over twelve hours. Right now, we have no clue were the Akatsuki's base is, however, the Kazekage was attacked a number of weeks ago by the same organization, and was able to defeat his opponent and as of now, are searching for the base themselves. We will meet up with the Kazekage and his siblings in a few days to find and destroy the base. Shikamaru, I want you to draw up traveling plans for everyone in this room and anyone else you may need, as well as battle plans for fighting five S-class missing Nins, at least two of which are capable of defeating a kage in battle."

"Hai, Hokage-sama, it would help my planning if I knew of the abilities of the members of this group, do we have any information on them?" Asked Shikamaru, in a voice that showed that his laziness had abandoned him for now.

"Unfortunately, most of the information we have is on two specific members, who are now deceased. We do know however, that there are two grass-nin, one cloud-nin, at least one-stone Nin, Sasori of the Red Sand, and the leader, of whom we know nothing. I am going to need this ready by sunset, because that is when we are leaving. If you need anyone else, let us know and we will find them." Replied Tsunade.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

True to her word, the group of nine shinobi were speeding through the forest bordering the village in an attempt to rendezvous with the Suna group by noon of the next day. They ran far into the night before they took their first break. The formation was a quite efficient diamond pattern with Gai in front, flanked by Shino and Lee. Behind those two were Jiraiya to the left, Shikamaru in the middle, and Kakashi to the right. Behind the middle of the group was Sasuke on the left and Tsunade on the right followed by Hinata. The reasoning for this was explained by Shikamaru earlier:

"_Ok, here's the moving formation. It'll be a diamond shape since we want to be able to defend ourselves, and search for Naruto. Gai will be the first person, he has both the skill and speed to detect traps, or ambushes. Behind him will be Shino and Lee. Shino will be able to scout using his bugs, without breaking formation keeping the defense of the group higher, while Lee has the speed to escape, should something…unforeseen come up. The next line will be Jiraiya and Kakashi on either side of me. That way I can see what is happening, and Jiraiya and Kakashi can cause major damage should we get caught in a trap. Behind the middle line, is Hokage-sama, and the Uchiha. Hokage-sama can deal with any wounds that way, and the Uchiha can act as kind of a bodyguard. Hinata, with your byakugan you'll be the rear guard as well as medical back up."_

The mood was tense as the group took turns standing watch and sleeping. It seemed as if something was missing from the group. Shikamaru had the nagging feeling that he was forgetting something. Like there was a hole, and it needed to be filled, but there wasn't anyone who could do what he wanted. The jounins as well had the feeling. Gai even forgot to be insulted by Kakashi's 'hip-attitude' when he blew the green clad taijutsu master off. Tsunade and Jiraiya were worried over the blonde boy who had worked his way into both of their hearts, while Hinata took the news of Naruto's predicament the worst. No one could tell, but Hinata was actually not in control of her own body at the time. The nibi was controlling her body, since Hinata had gone into shock upon hearing that Naruto had been captured by the Akatsuki. Eventually everyone drifted into an uneasy sleep, permeated by nightmare scenarios of the Kyuubi's rebirth or escape.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

The next day found the group traveling at breakneck speeds once more, in an effort to shorten the distance between them and Naruto's attackers. They had been moving since daybreak on a light breakfast, adrenaline, and soldier pills. Around eleven o'clock they had slowed down for a quick lunch. It was imperative for them to be well nourished because when they found the location of the base, they would be fighting immediately. Just as they finished, they felt a humongous spike in chakra, about half a mile from their current position. The only one who recognized it was Sasuke.

"T-th-that's Gaara's chakra." Sasuke stammered.

The group doubled its speed and caught up to the enraged Kazekage in a matter of minutes. When they arrived, they found the suna-sibblings fighting around the entrance of a dank looking cave. Outside were three of the members of the Akatsuki. The two grass shinobi, and one stone-ninja were outside fighting Gaara, whose sand was circling the three. As the group came close enough to help the Kazekage and his siblings, Gaara succeeded in catching one of the grass ninja in his sand.

"**Sabaku Kyuu**!" (Desert Graveyard) Stated Gaara calmly. He then closed his outstretched hand compressing the cocoon of sand. "**Sabaku Sousou**!**" (**Desert Funeral)

As the blood of the now deceased grass ninja seeped through the sand, Shino was able to sneak up behind the other grass ninja. This one had a high collar around his cloak, which made him resemble a Venus flytrap, or a Lion-Ant. This was but part of this ninja's interesting markings. His face has half black and half white, the dividing line, being vertically down the middle of his face. Shino sent some of his chakra eating bugs at the awkwardly clothed ninja. Surprisingly, the ninja simply laughed at the young Aburame's attempt.

"Foolish child, your attack won't work. I can freely move my chakra though the flora in my surroundings. Your bugs will never be able to deprive me. I know that you don't have any other kinds of insects residing in your body, so you can't win. Now DIE!" The missing Nin attacked Shino with impressive speed, and before anyone could help the young bug user, the attacking ninja had turned his right arm into a club with sharp thorns protruding from it. He landed a crushing blow to Shino's head, eliciting gasps of shock from the remaining Konoha and Suna shinobi, only for Shino to turn into a section of tree branch, as part of a replacement technique. Shino reappeared in the midst of the group and giving a nod to Sasuke, resumed his place in the defensive arrangement.

Sasuke jumped into the fight with the grass ninja who was named Zetsu. Completing a familiar set of hand seals, Sasuke breathed in deeply before exhaling a gigantic fire ball.

"**Katon: Goukakyuu no Jutsu**!" (Fire skill: Grand Fireball)

As Sasuke engulfed the older shinobi in fire, he watched as the form inside simply disappeared. No one knew where the mysterious Nin disappeared to, but they were all waiting for him to reveal himself. The fine hairs on the back of Sasuke's neck began to prickle as a sense of déjà vu over took him. Realization hit the young Uchiha and he quickly leapt backwards away from his previous position, as his multi colored opponent exploded out of the ground. 'Doton: Shinjuu Zanshu no Jutsu' (Earth skill: Inner decapitation) Sasuke thought, while preparing for his next attack. However, as he was about to attack with another katon jutsu, Zetsu, suddenly screamed out in pain and dropped to the ground writhing in pain.

"What…the hell did you do to me?" He screamed as he began furiously clawing at his own body.

"I had some aphids and other herbivorous insects attach themselves to you earlier, and they began to eat away at your body. I was able to increase their rate of consumption and their metabolism with my chakra." Replied Shino. "If your chakra was outside your body that meant that you couldn't use it to shield yourself in case of another attack. I wouldn't try to use it now anyways. I've also attached an equal number of my chakra devouring bugs to you."

The group could only watch as the body of the plant/human shinobi became porous and eventually the ninja lay dead, the insects continuing to devour him. Shikamaru used the shock of the remaining Akatsuki member to capture the Iwa Kunoichi in his **Kagemane no Jutsu** (Shadow bind technique). Gaara made quick work of the imprisoned women, and the now twelve person team entered the dark cave that was the home of the Akatsuki.

**_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA_**

(A/N: Well, there it is, chapter 9, I hope everyone likes the story, and I'm sorry to inform you that I only foresee another two or three chapters left. But fear not! I still have the largest plot twist in the history of…well…history to pull, before I can sign off on this fic. I've updated the summary, a few people have suggested it as the reason that I'm not receiving a larger number of reviews. I would be eternally grateful if I could manage more than one review this week, so please, please, please review! Anyway, the next chapter will be out next weekend. Until then, I think I'll torture everyone some more by leaking the only named chapter I can think off.

Return and Attack chapter 10: **Out of paper work, a savior is born?**

Or at least it'll be something like that. Oh well.)


	10. Of Paper Work and Saviors: Part I

**(A/N: Chapter 10 will be divided into two or three sections, chronicling the fights between the remaining members of Akatsuki and the eventual confrontation with the leader.) **

**Without further ado, I present, **

**Return and Attack: Chapter 10: Of Paper Work and Saviors**

**Part 1: "A Fight Thirteen Years in the Making.**

As the nine leaf shinobi, plus three, entered the cave, they quickly became entrapped in a maze of twisting, turning hallways. It had been just over three hours, and still, the group hadn't encountered any resistance or any signs of life, just stalactites that provided a conduit for slowly dripping water. Time seemed to creep by as the twelve person rescue team marched onward towards an inevitable confrontation. After another four hours or so, although it seemed much longer, since there was no light to give an indication of time, the group stopped for an uneasy dinner. It was during this time that Shikamaru adopted his now infamous thinking position.

"Kazekage-sama," asked the lazy genius "What can you tell me about one of your nukenin, more specifically, Sasori of the Red Sand?"

"WHAT?" screamed Kankuro in surprise. "Akasuna no Sasori is one of our opponents?"

"From the information we have, yes, he is one of the remaining members." Replied Shikamaru. "Why are you surprised is he infamous or something?"

"You could say that." Huffed Kankuro. "Sasori of the Red Sand is famous for being the greatest puppet master of all time. He even created the puppets I use. I also heard that he may have had a hand in the death of the Sandaime Kazekage."

"Can you tell me anything about him, or his abilities?" Asked Shikamaru, becoming slightly annoyed that another one of his battle strategies was useless, if he created the puppets that Kankuro used, than no doubt, he would know about the weapons hidden in them. Kankuro couldn't fight Sasori.

"From what I know, he's a master of poisons as well as puppets. I have heard that his grandmother, who is also a famous puppeteer, had a technique that could topple a castle, and that Sasori improved it to, so that he could topple entire villages. Other than that, I don't know too much." Stated Kankuro, raking his brains for the information.

With that, Shikamaru resumed his previous pondering, as the others in the group continued eating, and preparing themselves. After a few minutes, Shikamaru's eyes popped open.

"Alright, in order for us to have the best chances of survival, we're going to split up once we meet up with anybody. Hokage-sama will go after Sasori, since he is well versed in poisons, and we might need her healing abilities. Like wise, Kazekage-sama, you should go after him as well; he is one of your missing Nins. Since he is probably the stronger of the two opponents, Kakashi and Gai, you go with Hokage-sama. Shino, your bugs are the best to attack a puppeteer with and Uchiha, you can help I guess. That leaves Kankuro, Temari, Hinata, Lee, Jiraiya-sama and I to take care of the cloud Nin. When either group is finished, we should regroup. If for any reason, the leader decides to come out themselves, Jiraiya, Hokage-sama, and Kazekage-sama should focus on him/her. After that, we move on towards Naruto."

Everyone resumed the trek farther into the cave with a new determination.

_**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**_

Once again the group was forced to stop for rest. They had been running through cavernous hallways for at least twelve hours now, and if Sasuke, Hinata, and Kakashi hadn't checked at least six times, everyone would have sworn they were stuck in a genjutsu. They decided that it made no sense to continue on and fact two deadly missing Nins without sleep, so they camped down in the cave for a few hours. Not to mention the eerie fact that the torches that were spread throughout the passage way, had suddenly gone out, leaving them in the dark, literally and figuratively.

"Shikamaru, may I have a word with you?" Asked Tsunade, while the group was resting. "Alone." The tone of her voice made it obvious that she was unhappy with some decision he had made.

"I wanted to know, why you made Hinata face the cloud Nin, you know her history with that village."

"Hai, Hokage-sama, but in all honesty, the byakugan and jyuken can't help fight against wooden puppets. I didn't want her to fight a Kumo Nin, given that they attempted to kidnap her and she might react negatively to that, but since wood doesn't have tenketsu to close…" Shikamaru stopped speaking, having made his point.

"All right, I can see that, but why don't you help us with Sasori, I'm sure Sasuke or Gai would handle the other guy easily, right?" She asked.

At this Shikamaru adopted a serious attitude and chose his words carefully.

"First off, since your group has two jounin and two kage's there shouldn't be any trouble, and secondly, if he really does have a technique that can destroy a town, than it probably involves multiple puppets and kagemane can only hold so much." The lazy teenager replied.

Having finished her questioning, Tsunade returned to her position in the group, leaving Shikamaru to his thoughts.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

When the group woke up, the quickly packed up their small 'camp', and checked their supplies before once again, running through the dark passage, and after an hour, arrived at a large cavernous opening. It was very dark, and there were only one or two torches in the entire cavern, which was very large. They both seemed to frame a small wooden door.

"To get to that door, you'll have to get past me first." A voice rang out in the cavern, the echoes distorting its origin.

The twelve intruding ninja's froze at the sound of the voice. Well, to be truthful, nine out the of the twelve froze, Tsunade, Jiraiya, and Gaara continued on, and if anything got in their way, than what ever it was would die, slowly and painfully.

When the trio didn't head the voices warnings, a large bolt of electricity struck the ground in front of the advancing ninja.

"Well, I guess that answers one question." Shikamaru replied lazily, although internally, he was crunching many different attack strategies and patterns.

Recognizing the attack as one commonly used by kumo ninja's, the group assigned to hunt Sasori quickly broke away from the other six ninja. After failing to sense any other chakra signatures, Tsunade's group ran towards the door.

"Fools." The invisible foe muttered under his breath.

As he prepared another raiton jutsu to attack the 'fleeing' ninja, his attack was deflected by a bunch of kunai and shuriken, thrown by the toad sannin, Lee, and Shikamaru. Once the six members of the other squad were through the tunnel, Tsunade created a small cave-in with her strength, sealing off the rest of the Konoha Nin.

'Damn, with just those two torches, I don't have that much shadow to work with.' Thought Shikamaru.

Suddenly the figure of their opponent appeared over by the pile of fallen rock, inspecting it. No sooner than the figure, touched the ground, than Shikamaru formed a familiar seal, stretching his shadow towards the Akatsuki member. Just as his shadow was about to bind the ninja, the figure disappeared and the pair of torches extinguished themselves.

'Shit!' thought Shikamaru, 'now I don't have any light to work with, I guess I'll have to make some, but I don't know any katon jutsu.'

Since there was no light, this left Lee and the two sand siblings at a disadvantage as well. Temari could simply pepper the area with gusts from her fan, but it would consume a lot of chakra. Kankuro wasn't much help, since his puppets were directed by him and he could see, or sense chakra signatures, other than general directions.

Hinata and Jiraiya, however, could either see or feel the presence of the ninja. They both took up defensive positions in the group, ready to counter whatever the ninja might do.

"Hmm, the Sannin Jiraiya, a Nara, the siblings of Shukaku's vessel, and, what's this? A Hyuuga? Interesting. I wonder…" A voice rang out through the darkness, seemingly from all directions. With four-sixths of the group unable to pinpoint the location of their adversary, the group could only jump out of the way, as a kunai, tagged with an exploding note was hurled into the center of the circle. The explosion lit up the cavernous area that the sextet was engaging the Akatsuki member, for just enough time that they were able to check out the terrain. And for the missing Nin to make a haunting remark.

"Short, dark hair, and a pair of byakugan eyes. It seems that I may yet be able to strike at the Hyuuga clan, even after these twelve years."

Hinata's eyes widened, and she began to shake. Hinata, who had been in a state of shock since Naruto's abduction, finally asserted herself, wrestling control of her body away from the Nibi.

"Y-you!" She exclaimed, before sinking to her knees upon realizing who their foe was.

Before anything could happen, Shikamaru, Temari, Kankuro, and Lee rushed to the fallen girls' side, protecting her from any attack that may come. Temari placed her hand on Hinata's shoulders and tried to talk with the shaking girl.

"Hinata-san, what's wrong?" She asked

"T-th-that m-ma-man was the one who tried to k-kid-kidnap me, wh-when I was t-three." The shy girl replied. Then in a loud voice, she screamed at the top of her lungs, "I WILL KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU HAVE CAUSED MY FAMILY TO GO THROUGH!"

In a rush of white chakra, the once shy and quiet girl, activated her bloodline limit and charged her past and present tormentor. The man was very quick, and he dodged her early jyuken strikes. However, after only a few seconds, Jiraiya joined the battle, and made the man's task of dodging an enraged Hinata's attacks, that much harder. Just as she was about to land a severe strike to his heart, he disappeared from her line of sight.

"I don't know how you're alive, but I can guarantee that it won't be for much longer!" she cried, as she moved to attack the man who had once been the head shinobi of Kumogakure.

But as she was about to re-engage the ninja, she heard Jiraiya yell out: "Katon: Katon: Ryuuka no Jutsu" (Fire skill: Dragon Fire technique.) The attack caught the missing nin, completely off-guard. The dragon incinerated him, only for it to turn into a smoldering rock, the moss on the rock, igniting due to the intense flame it was exposed to. In the faint light that was provided, Jiraiya watched as the ninja ran at incredible speeds, even surpassing Lee, towards Hinata. Just as he was about to strike her, he suddenly stopped in his tracks.

"Kagemane no jutsu, success." Came the voice of Shikamaru. "No hurry up and finish this before the stupid rock goes out!" Hinata quickly stuck the man with a jyuken strike to the head, while Jiraiya powered a rasengan into his chest from behind.

Hinata was panting from using so much of the Nibi's chakra, but the group was, for the most part, unharmed. The group was about to begin working to clear the debris of Tsunade's cave-in, when suddenly, an explosion in the ceiling of the cave, showered Shikamaru, Temari, Lee, and Kankuro with rock. If Kankuro hadn't used his puppets to create a shield for the group, than they certainly would have been crushed. When Hinata and Jiraiya turned around, they noticed that the cloud ninja was standing up, a black substance was healing his injuries.

"That was quit impressive, had I actually been alive, than that would have definitely killed me." The man quipped.

"Not alive, what do you mean?" Hinata asked, glaring at the regenerating ninja.

"He means he's been resurrected by a jutsu, most likely **Kuchiyose no Jutsu: Edo Tensei** (Summoning technique: Underworld Resurrection.)" Jiraiya responded. "That means that his soul is attached to the body, probably by a special kunai or physical object.

"Very good, of course you are the Toad Sannin, so I really shouldn't underestimate you." The ninja chuckled back.

Hinata activated her byakugan to search for the kunai that held the ninja's soul in the body. But she couldn't find anything. She began to pump more charka into her eyes, searching for anything that wasn't regular. However, the Kumo ninja had no plans to allow her to scan his body. So he moved to attack her, only to be intercepted by Jiraiya. He launched a large ball of fire at the missing nin, forcing the undead soldier to dodge the attack. Meanwhile, Hinata kept scanning her opponent for any irregularities of his charka system. Suddenly she found the answer to her problems.

"Jiraiya-sama, if you can stop his movements, I think I can destroy the body!" She cried, keeping her pale eyes on her target.

Jiraiya simply nodded, and performing a number of hand seals, cried out: "**Doton: Yomi Numa!"** (Earth skill: Swamp of the Underworld.)

The hard rock of the cave quickly became a very large, very deep swamp. The offending cloud ninja was caught by surprise, and quickly became ensnared in the thick muck. Running on top of the summoned swamp, Hinata ran towards the waist deep man, and planted a sharp jyuken strike on his chest. But instead of simply forcing charka through a tenketsu, she forced a large amount of charka into a strange seal that was placed on her opponents' chest.

"Hah! Do you really think you can kill me with that stupid taijutsu style of yours?" The cloud ninja laughed at Hinata's attempt to kill him a second time.

"Yes." Was the only reply he received as a sharp pain shot through his chest.

Suddenly Hinata was gone, telling Jiraiya to move and help the remainder of the group, who were still trapped under the pile of debris. As she did this, the former cloud nin gave a shout of pain and simply exploded.

"What did you do?" Asked the perverted hermit.

"I forced a very large amount of charka through the seal that was keeping his soul rooted to the body." Hinata explained. Once again, she activated her byakugan and searched the rock pile for signs of her comrades. Finding them trapped, but alive, she began to surgically destroy the piles of rock with well aimed jyuken strikes, and Jiraiya summoned some toads to help clear out the pile as well. After an hour, the collapsed area was small enough for the four trapped ninja to escape. Now focusing all of their attention to the caved in tunnel, courtesy of Tsunade, the group began to clear out larger piles of rock and earth. Eventually they were able to move ahead, towards the advance group, and Sasori of the Red Sand.

**(A/N: Wow, I'd like to thank all the people who have reviewed, and I'd like to say that Chapter 9 is one of the most popular chapter's I've had since I published the story. Please continue to review, and give me any kinds of suggestions you may have, for the fight with Sasori, I'm not too great at choreographing fight scenes. I am splitting up chapter 10 into more manageable pieces. I wanted to have three very good fights, and it would make the chapter very long if I wanted to put all three into one update. I have still yet to reveal my largest plot twist to date, although the one I put in this chapter I like very much. But anyway, This will actually prolong the end of the story, since many of you seem to like it. Thanks, and keep reviewing!**

**-Nightblade888)**


	11. Of Paper Work and Saviors: Part II

**Return and Attack Chapter 10: Of Paper Work and Saviors**

**Part II: Red Sand vs. Sand and Leafs**

The group consisting of Gaara, Tsunade, Kakashi, Gai, Sasuke and Shino continued to race towards their next opponent while their fellow comrades were fighting the Cloud Akatsuki. Tsunade's cave-in effectively sealed them off from the other group, and in essence, any chance of reinforcements. Finding themselves in a continuation of the corridor that they were traveling earlier, the group raced on, in hopes that they would be able to save Naruto from a certain death. After a relatively short amount of time, the group came into another expansive cavern, even larger than the last one. The main difference was that this one was completely barren, and was lighter. The other obvious difference was that it was empty. While the other ninja had broken cover, quickly after the group had entered, this room was completely empty. Gai was in front of the group, his speed would allow him to dodge any trap that was set, and behind him were Kakashi and Sasuke, their sharingan would allow them to react to any traps or ambushes that may have been set. Just as Gai entered the 'room' a tail, gleaming with poison appeared from his left. The green clad taijutsu master dodged the tail, and counter attacked with a right footed heel kick. As he disappeared to the groups left, the rest flooded the cavern to watch as the jounin's kick was blocked with the tail. The metal of the weights Gai wore clashed against metal blades stored on the tail of what could only be described as a scorpion. There against the wall of a cavern, stood a hunched over figure, draped in a black coat adorned in red clouds. He had a large tail coming from his back.

Upon having his initial attack blocked, Gai quickly rejoined the team, a safe distance away from the figure.

"Ah, I see that you have Itachi's younger brother with you, which is good, we could ill afford to allow my former partner to obtain a weapon such as the sharingan." The figure said.

Sasuke merely looked at the figure, eyes shifting from onyx black, to a crimson red. Flashing through a series of hand seals, the final Uchiha released a large ball of flame from his mouth, directly at the hunched over figure. It just stood there, as the fire ball collided with its body.

The group was surprised when the figure emerged from the blaze with no visible damage, save for its cloak. It was a figure, with two arms and legs, unlike a true scorpion, its legs seemed to be normal, as well as its right arm and the left arm seemed to be covered in a weird gauntlet. The tail sprouting from his back seemed to come from the mouth of a face that adorned his back.

Just as he appeared from the inferno caused by Sasuke, Gaara's sand enveloped the man's arms and legs as well as the tail. Taking this as their cue, Gai, Kakashi and Sasuke attacked the body of their opponent. All of their attacks did little damage however. Shino was about to send out his kikai bugs, however the Godaime, in a fit of rage, ran forward and obliterated the body in one punch.

Dust and splintered wood flew into the air, as a black figure emerged from the debris and coolly addressed the group.

"As expected from Tsunade the legendary sannin, however, I will make you pay for damaging my favorite puppet." The man, who could now be identified as Sasori of the Red Sand said.

Sasori emerged from a small cloud of smoke still circulating around the cavern, and the group was able to see the true face of their opponent for the first time.

The young man standing before them was quit handsome, with blonde hair and light skin. He was wearing the standard cloak and it covered most of his features. Looking over the team of six, Sasori took view of his situation.

"Hmm, it seems that I have the pleasure of fighting two kage's and the legendary copy-ninja Kakashi. I think I have just the puppet for you. Especially you, Kazekage-_sama_." He spoke those words with only mild interest in his voice, however the inflection in his voice at the end when he mentioned Gaara was indication that what ever puppet he had, they wouldn't like it.

Removing a scroll, Sasori used it to summon a puppet in the shape of a man with black hair wearing a black shaggy coat. Only two people recognized this puppet. It was the Sandaime Kazekage, said to be the strongest of the five leaders.

"Since I don't have time to waste on the likes of you, I must make this quick. I hope you'll all go to your deaths knowing what fine puppets you all will make." The puppet master said with a hint of excitement in his voice.

A black cloud began to emerge from the puppet of the sandaime, and began to form itself into a large block.

"What is that?" Asked Tsunade, directing her question at Gaara.

"That is Satetsu (Iron Sand). It is the Sandaime's own creation. He was able to control the magnetic forces, and created this jutsu after a previous host of Shukaku's. You will not be able to copy it." He stated, rather calmly, directing the last part of his statement at Sasuke and Kakashi.

With a flick of his wrist, Sasori had the puppet propel the block of small metal particles at the group. They all scattered, with the exception of Gaara. He simply stood were he was, and waited for the block to reach him. There was a loud explosion as the block hit the ground, hiding Gaara from the view of the fighters. As the dust settled, there stood Gaara, hands still crossed over his chest, with sand swirling around him like a swarm of bee's buzzes around its hive.

"As long as there is sand in the attack, Shukaku can control it. It doesn't matter if it is the third's signature attack." He stated, directing his retort as Sasori, who had a look of annoyance written on his face.

Gaara quickly sent his sand towards the puppet in an attempt to crush it. Sasori flicked his wrist again, but the puppet didn't respond to his actions. As the sand enveloped the puppet and crushed its mechanical parts, Gaara gave a nod towards Shino for helping to sever the chakra strings.

"It seems that I have underestimated you." Replied Sasori. "Although, I doubt very much that what I am about to do is necessary, I must accomplish my goals at all costs. **Aka Higi: Hyakki no Soen**!" (Red Secret Technique: Performance of a Hundred Puppets).

Sasori took off his cloak, revealing that he had turned himself into a puppet. A compartment opened on his right breast, revealing a chakra strings spinner. He then removed a scroll from his back and tossed it into the air. Suddenly 100 puppets, all once living, breathing people came to life, to serve Sasori.

Quickly, the six allied shinobi's went to work on the puppets, Shino used his kikai bugs to severe chakra strings, and Gai, crushed the defenseless puppets before Sasori could reattach his strings. Sasuke and Kakashi, were both using **Katon: Housenka no Jutsu** (Fire Skill: Mythical Fire Flower) to shoot multiple balls of fire at the puppets, thinning the ranks at a quick pace. Meanwhile, Gaara and Tsunade both engaged the puppets that were guarding their puppeteer, making short work of them. As they moved towards the young man, more puppets were called from the fray to guard their master, but Kakashi used his own version of the mangekyo sharingan to send those puppets to another dimension. With their backs clear, Tsunade was able to land a chakra laden punch to Sasori's stomach, sending him into the air, where Gaara's sand caught him, before crushing the puppeteer.

Upon seeing their foe's death, the other shinobi caught their breath, and attempted to replenish their chakra. Suddenly, a sword flew through the air at Tsunade, poison gleaming of the blade, thrown from a puppet that shouldn't be moving about. The move was very sudden, and had Gaara's sand not caught it, the fifth Hokage would have been poisoned and of little help in the continuing fight.

"It's useless to try and kill me, I can take control over any of my puppets at any time, you will never find me, so you can't kill me." Sasori exclaimed from the puppet he was controlling.

This time, he took the offensive, revealing poisoned blades from his new arms, and attacking the chakra depleted Kakashi. However, before he could reach the panting grey haired jounin, a wall of sand emerged in front of the attacking puppeteer, blocking his path. It was at this time that Shino's observant eyes, hidden behind his sunglasses, noticed the only similarity between the old Sasori and the new one.

"Hokage-sama, that talisman over his heart, it must be what allows him to create chakra. If you destroy it, you may be able to kill Sasori." The young bug wielder pointed out. The message was delivered quietly, so that their opponent didn't figure out that they knew his weakness.

Armed with the new information, Tsunade and Gaara reengaged Sasori. Gaara was able to grab a hold of Sasori's legs, and used his sand to immobilize the joints. Tsunade then ran forward and delivered another crushing blow, this time to the talisman, which suddenly popped out of the puppet, where it was caught in a ball of fire, courtesy of Kakashi.

Just as Sasori's human remains were smoldering out of existence, the other six shinobi were able to catch up to Tsunade and Gaara's group. Before they moved on, Tsunade and Hinata treated all the wounds that were incurred during the fighting. The most damage was some bruising on the four ninja that were caught in the cave-in caused by the cloud ninja. Other than that no one had any remarkable injuries, and after handing out soldier pills, the twelve moved on down a hallway that seemed to have a light down a long tunnel.

As the group ran towards the light, they were all worried that if they were late, their efforts would be for naught. Tsunade, and Sasuke were worried that they would loose their brother, Kakashi was afraid that one of his first students would die, like his old teammates did, and Hinata was the most worried of them all. If she lost Naruto, she didn't know what she would do. Quickly taking the lead, Tsunade ran forward at a pace that was matched only by the two demon vessels, and Maito Gai. When they reached the door, they didn't even slow down, as Tsunade pulled her arm back and shattered the door with one swing of her arm.

At first the light was too intense for the twelve rescuers, due to their virtual seclusion into darkness, and they were forced to avert their eyes. However, the sound of battle rang out a reached their ears. As their vision cleared, they saw the object of their search fighting Orochimaru. Kabuto's body was laying on the ground, as well as the body of a man wearing black robes, who had spiky black hair. Both Kabuto's eyes and the eyes of the Akatsuki member were glazed over in death. The sound of steel clashing with steel brought the spectators back to reality. They watched as Naruto fought on par with the legendary snake sannin.

"Well brat, it seems that we've gotten a bit of a crowd. I think I'll finish you with the technique that did Sarutobi-sensei in." Orochimaru chuckled. "**Kuchiyose no Jutsu: Edo Tensei** (Impure World Resurrection)!"

Out of the ground sprang four coffins, with the kanji for one, two, three, and four emblazoned on the front. Naruto simply stood their, watching as the coffins of the former Hokages of Konoha rose up before him.

"Nice try, you bastard" the blonde said in a serious voice. "Too bad it won't work this time. You see, those two" he points at the caskets of the Shodaime and Nidaime "were sealed into kage bunshins of the old man, so they can't be resurrected, their souls are in the stomach of the shinigami." True to his word, when the first two caskets creaked open, the bodies that were to be used as sacrifices for the technique to work fell out, still dead and lifeless.

"Now the third, since he summoned the god of death, that means his soul was eaten as well, so he can't be resurrected." As with the previous two coffins, the one bearing the insignia of the third hokage opened and a sacrificial body fell out.

"And that one" the blonde pointed to the casket of the most feared hokage in the history of Konoha. "That one…is mine."

The coffin opened, and out fell another body, devoid of any signs of life.

"Now that you've wasted as much chakra as you have, I think I'll kill you now." The blonde said emotionlessly. He charged forward as an incredible speed and used shunshin to appear right in front of Orochimaru. Launching a right roundhouse kick to the snake's left side, he only paused for a moment as his kick was blocked, however the force of the blow was still enough to dislocate the elbow and shatter Orochimaru's forearm. The snake sannin hissed in pain as the blonde who claimed to be the fourth hokage reversed his momentum, and launched a right heel kick to Orochimaru's rib cage on the left side of his body. Once again this was blocked, but the force still broke the bone. The blonde just smiled as he used his left leg and arm to launch himself into the air, parallel to the ground. He arched over Orochimaru's head and landed a left foot to the snake's collar bone, breaking it in half.

As the blonde separated from the snake, the twelve onlookers were in awe. Not only had Naruto severely damaged a sannin, but he had done it while he was blocked. As the two stared each other down, Jiraiya was rummaging through one of the bags he had hidden on his person. Finding what he was looking for, the toad hermit threw a strange looking object at the teenager, with only a warning of "Catch!"

The blond caught the object in his left hand, and upon looking at it, his face lit up in a smile.

"Thanks, Jiraiya-sensei!" He cried out before hurling an oddly shaped, three pronged kunai at the snake sannin's head. Orochimaru simply turned his head to the right and the missile flew harmlessly past.

"My my, that was a waste of my comrade's gift." The pale man chuckled.

"You wish, bastard." The blonde replied, chakra spinning in his hand. "Here's a new attack for you Raisengan" Suddenly the blonde disappeared, and reappeared behind the legendary sannin, who was now sporting a large hole in his chest.

As Orochimaru fell over dead, the remaning ninja could only stare at the once 'dead last' who had just killed the legendary Orochimaru. As he turned around, the group could see for the first time that something was wrong with Naruto. The whisker marks on his cheeks were gone.

"N-Naruto…" Tsunade stuttered as she tried to make coherent speech.

"I'm sorry, Tsunade, but Naruto isn't in at the moment." The blonde responded.

"Who are you then?" She asked. "Y-You're n-not the K-k-kyuubi, are you?"

"No, the bastard fox is inside this ugly sculpture that's supposed to pass as a medium for the souls of the biju." He replied. "Right now, it's just me." He responded.

"Ano, if you're not Naruto-kun, than who are you?" Demanded Hinata from the back of the group.

"Ah, that's a good question, my name is Kazama Arashi, and I am the Fourth Hokage." The blonde said, smiling.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA **

**(A/N: Well that's just great, the cliff hanger to end all cliff hangers. Oh well, just to let you know, 'chapter 10' has one more part before it is finished, and that will be the explanation of how the fourth hokage came to be in possession of Naruto's body. It will also contain the explanation for the name of the chapter, but that's kind of beside the point. **

**_The raisengan is a move of my own invention; it is a combination of the rasengan, raikiri, and hiraishin. Naruto or the fourth uses Hiraishin (Flying Thunder God) to teleport to the special kunai, and in the process, thrust a rasengan into an opponent like the raikiri. I decided that the chidori and raikiri should be different moves, while the chidori is concentrated on the energy in the palm of the hand; the raikiri focuses on the thrust of the attack._**

**I would like to thank the following people who have reviewed my story: hells-fox, Embrace nothing, conlan0414863, the DragonBard, Sherely Cano, Suzerain, Basty, Mealstorm, jifury, Silver Warrior, DizzlingDon, Saotome Kyuubi, VASHD1, nonengel, Requim of the Desert, Narutorules, narut0-fan101, dogbertcarroll, Gambet, and necroneox3d. All of your advice and suggestions have helped me out a lot, and I hope you'll continue to review. Thanks!)**


	12. Of Paper Work and Saviors: Part III

**Return and Attack: Chapter 10: Of Paper Work and Saviors**

**Part III: The Reasons for Being**

The man, who identified himself as Kazama Arashi, stared into the faces of nine people he had never seen before in his life. Only the faces of Tsunade, Jiraiya, and Kakashi held any semblance of understanding.

"But…that's impossible…the yondaime died….kyuubi." The jumbled words sprang from Sasuke's mouth as well as Hinata's. Shino was just as surprised but he didn't show it, and Shikamaru was staring at him intensely. Rock Lee was dumbfounded, and on the verge of collapsing onto the ground, while the sand siblings were very confused indeed.

"Well, I can see that some things need clearing up." Arashi said. "All right, this may come as a shock to some of you, but I wasn't able to kill the kyuubi. Not out right at least, you see something like the Kyuubi simply can't be killed, it is too powerful, and its regeneration abilities make it almost immortal. Not even the god of death was able to kill it in the end, despite my hopes that it would. So I was left with only one option, I had to seal it into something."

"Wait, a minute, we don't even know you, and you expect us to believe that you are the fourth Hokage, and you sealed the kyuubi that attacked us into Naruto?" Temari screeched at the blonde boy. "I think you must have taken too many lumps on the head or something."

"I'll explain that." Jiraiya interrupted the conversation going on in the crowd. "I don't know how, but that must be my former student. No one else, not even Naruto could have performed the Hiraishin no jutsu (Flying Thunder God technique). That was what the kunai I threw him was for. He became famous for that technique, and earned his nickname as the 'Yellow Flash of Konoha'. But if you want more proof, just look at his cheeks; the 'whisker' marks are gone, which shows that the kyuubi was removed. My question is, how are you even alive?"

"That's a good one, Jiraiya-sensei. I guess I should explain, you see the story of 'Uzumaki Naruto' is very long and even more complicated than many of you know or realize. If any of you have looked, you would know that there is no Uzumaki clan in Konoha. Not only that, but there never has been, and if any one by that name ever liven in the village, than there are no records to show it. To seal an entity such as the Kyuubi, the vessel must not have developed its chakra pathways in any shape or form. Therefore, a newly born child is needed."

"Oh, that makes sense, so that would explain why you chose Naruto-kun." Hinata stated a bit worried, her boyfriend had suddenly disappeared, and been replaced by the thought to be dead Yondaime Hokage.

"Actually the reason that I 'chose' Naruto isn't nearly that cut and dried. I knew a few things when I prepared to seal the demon away, the first was that this kid would probably be wanted for its power, and therefore would need to be able to defend itself. The easiest way to do that was to use the child of a shinobi family. The only problem, was that the youngest born child at the time, was the Yamanaka's daughter, and I couldn't ask for them to give up their child."

"Wait, are you implying that Naruto is your son?" Asked a startled Shikamaru, partially due to the situation, partially due to the knowledge that had things been a little bit different, Ino could have been the vessel.

"In a way yes, he is my son. But I was never married, never had a wife, or a child. To understand Naruto, what he is, what he's done, you must first know a bit about his favorite technique. The kage bunshin no jutsu, is a kinjutsu, allowing a ninja to create solid clones out of nothing."

"Wait, I'm confused, Kirigakure has its mizu bunshin, and Orochimaru had mud clones, but why is the Kage bunshin on the list of kinjutsu?" Kakashi asked.

"Well, besides the fact that this seems to break the law of chemistry and physics by creating something from nothing, it uses a lot of chakra to perform. That is only part of the reason that it is included in the scroll seals. The second reason is due to what it could be used for." The fourth replied. The origins of the technique are actually from the beginnings of the village, hence why it is first on the scroll. The first Hokage actually created the technique to help him with his paper work, and I must say, it is a live saver."

"Now why didn't I think of that?" Tsunade groaned as she slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand.

"Anyway, since I didn't have any newborn babies from shinobi families, I either had to find one, or come up with another plan. What I ended up doing was improvising. I failed to kill the kyuubi outright, so I had to make a desperation back up plan, and hope that it worked. I created a kage bunshin, and poured enough chakra into it, to give it actual life. I called it **Kage Bunshin no jutsu: Sozo** or shadow clone: genesis. I used my own DNA and created a physical clone of myself to seal the kyuubi into. However, the clone doesn't have a soul, and had I simply placed the Kyuubi's soul and power into the clone, the Kyuubi would have taken over, and continued its destruction. So I used another kinjutsu, a version of Orochimaru's immortality technique, and transferred my soul into the clone as well. Since two souls cannot occupy the same body, a third soul was created as a mixture of the two. 'Naruto' is actually a mixture of the Kyuubi's personality with my own. That is why we bear such a striking resemblance, and why we share many of the same ideals. Also, it explains why he learns jutsus so fast, a clone automatically knows all the techniques of the original, and since I knew a bunch of them, all it took was some practice."

"Ok, that explains how you got hear, but it doesn't tell us why." Tsunade was rubbing her temples trying to digest all this information.

"Well…" The blonde paused, taking a deep breath before he began his narrative.

**Flashback**

Naruto was lying in a pool of water, unconscious, as the remaining members of the Akatsuki began to rip the soul of the Kyuubi out of him. Slowly he opened his eyes, to find himself in the familiar mindscape where the Kyuubi was imprisoned. He slowly got up and made his way towards the cell that held the Kyuubi prisoner. What he found wasn't a pleasant sight. The mighty demon was looking pale, and flickering in and out of existence in front of his eyes. Suddenly with a great pulse of chakra, both Naruto and the Kyuubi disappeared.

**End Flashback**

"So, the Kyuubi was removed from him." Jiraiya summed up.

"Yes, and along with it, 'Naruto'." Arashi explained.

Upon hearing this news, Hinata and many of Naruto's friends began to cry. The loudmouth blonde boy they had once known was no more. Tsunade had indeed lost her brother, again, and Sasuke wasn't any better. Hinata was once again bordering on the edge of shock at the thought of her love being gone for ever, yet having a constant reminder that he was still there. It was more than she could bear to think about.

"Now, I hope that you don't think for one second that I intend to keep things the way they are." Arashi said, when he saw the sad expression on his rescuers faces. "Once I finish this impromptu report to Tsunade, I plan on re-sealing the kyuubi inside of me, and recalling Naruto's soul."

At this, the sad expressions on the faces of many began to brighten and a small smile crept on their faces, despite their watering eyes.

"After the removal of the Kyuubi and Naruto, I was left in sole possession of this body. You should have seen the faces on the leader's face, when I got up and decked him in the face!" Arashi chuckled. "Anyway, it turns out that the leader of this organization was the first body that Orochimaru used his technique on. He had some blood line limit that allowed his soul to remain dormant until Orochimaru left him for another host. In doing so, he actually managed to absorb the snake's soul a bit, and inherited many of his abilities, as well as his ambitions. The goal of the Akatsuki was to create the perfect vessel for the leader, and the powers of the biju would create that body, with Shukaku's defense, the Nibi's ability to heal rapidly, and the Kyuubi's regeneration skills, it would be an invincible vessel, never aging, or growing weaker. But during our, rather anti-climactic fight, Orochimaru himself actually showed up, and re-absorbed his former container's soul, instead of simply containing it. That's why the body over there is dead." He motioned towards the body of the leader of the now defunct organization. "Since the snake bastard didn't know about my soul inhabiting Naruto's body, he thought he was fighting Naruto. Well, let's just say that Kabuto cannot take a rasengan to the head and live to talk about it. The snake still didn't recognize me though, and we fought for a good time, it was almost three hours from the start of our fight, until you guys showed up. It wouldn't have been as long, but I was really low on chakra, and being unconscious for two days doesn't help either."

"Wait, I thought that to drain the chakra of a biju as strong as the Kyuubi would take weeks, but it seems to have taken only a couple of days. What happened?" Jiraiya asked.

"Well, it seems that as a side effect of having three souls, the Kyuubi's soul wasn't as well anchored as it should have been, and when you mix that with the damn fox's want to leave, he was able to get out rather quickly." Arashi explained.

"What was that move that you killed Orochimaru with?" Asked Jiraiya, "I haven't seen you do that one before."

"Oh, that? That's something I just created, the raisengan; it uses the trust from Kakashi's raikiri, along with the Hiraishin."

"I thought that you couldn't perform the trust of the chidori without a sharingan to anticipate the enemy's counter attack." Sasuke said in a confused manner.

"That's true, but with sensei's hiraishin, he is too fast for anyone to counter attack him. So he can do the thrust as long as he uses the hiraishin without worrying." Kakashi explained.

"Wait!" Tsunade interrupted "How can you reseal the Kyuubi, won't you die in the process?"

"Actually, since the Kyuubi's soul is a part of this body, it won't kill the body, and since our souls will inhabit the same container again, Naruto's soul should return." Arashi explained.

Turning towards a large statue in the background, Arashi preformed a large number of hand seals before naming his jutsu.

"**Nagasu Kihaku Fuuin no Jutsu**! (Draining Soul Seal Technique)**"**

Suddenly a large amount of red chakra began to seep towards the blonde boy, before connecting with his small form. After a few minutes of stunned silence, two flashes of light descended on the form of Naruto/Yondaime before exploding into a large flash of light. When everyone's eyes readjusted to the scene, they found Naruto's body lying on the ground, unconscious but breathing, and the statue that previously held the soul and energy of the Kyuubi, cracked and falling apart. Tsunade and Hinata rushed forward to check on the fallen boy.

"It's all right; he's just passed out from exhaustion." Tsuande reported.

A wave of relief flooded the remaining members of the rescue party. Lifting Naruto, Tsunade walked over to the group and simply nodded.

"Let's go back. These people can never bother anyone again." She said and began the trek to return to Konoha.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Well, there it is, what I consider to be the greatest plot twist since Citizen Cane. I wasn't actually planning on writing this until next weekend, but my overbearing roommate's double header soccer match bought me the time to do it today. I'm sorry if I left you guys confused after the last chapter, but I thought it would create a better cliff hanger. I cannot take credit for the sealing technique, I used the one from Warrior's Strength, Child's Innocence by Airhead Dude, and I highly recommend you go read this fic, it's awesome. I did however, create Kage bunshin: Sozo. I thought of this idea a while ago, and I have yet to find someone who came up with it as well. As always please review and I'll have the next chapter out soon!)**


	13. Chapter 13

Naruto woke up to find himself in a familiar hallway, filled with water and pipes.

"What does the damn fox want now?" He grumbled out loud. He began to walk down the familiar passage, until it made an unexpected turn. Instead of finding himself in front of a large foreboding cage, he found himself in a wide open field, surprisingly reminiscent of Konoha.

"What the hell? Since when did the fur ball move?

"The Kyuubi isn't here." A voice declared from behind the blonde.

Naruto spun around to confront…himself?

"Who are you?" He yelled at the familiar figure.

"My name is Kazama Arashi. I am the Yondaime." The figure said.

"What the hell? What are you doing here?" Naruto asked in a loud voice.

Well, it's a long story." The Yondaime said. "I'm sure you know that I sealed the Kyuubi into you, and that the power you contain is too powerful for any one whose inner coils have solidified."

"Yeah, ero-sennin said something like that." The young blonde said.

"Well, you see, there weren't any children who I could entrust to hold the Kyuubi, so I made you." The Yondaime said.

"WHAT! YOU _MADE_ ME?" Naruto screamed at the older golden headed man.

The blonde man flinched at the screaming. "Yeah, I _made_ you. In reality you are a shadow clone so advanced that you became self-sustaining. That's the reason that Kage Bunshin is on the scroll of seals, because if Orochimaru got his hands on it…"

"He could create unlimited amounts of bodies that he could take." Naruto finished the sentence for the famous Hokage.

"Yes." Was the only response he received. "I don't know weather or not you heard this before, but, I never imagined that the villagers would react to you like that. I thought that they would hold you as a hero for imprisoning the Kyuubi, I'm sorry that I was wrong."

Naruto just sat down on the grass across from the blonde in his white robes. For a while silence permeated throughout the field.

"You know, for about six months after I found out about the Kyuubi, I didn't know what to think about you." Naruto said in a serious tone of voice. "Up until I was twelve, I adored you and the old man. You were some one to look up to, the Yondaime Hokage, greatest ninja in the know world. Then I find out that you sealed that fox in me, and I was confused. The third told me that it was your wish that the village treat me like a hero, and they were just too stupid to see me for who I was. But, I just couldn't get the idea that this was another one of kami's jokes at my expense, out of my head. I don't think it was until I left with the perverted hermit, that I was able burry those thoughts. You did what had to be done for the village. After the chunnin exams, I began to see many different people in the village as my precious people. I would gladly die for them, and yet they call for my head on a pole." During his monologue, Naruto's face had fallen from his usual grin to a flat line bordering on a scowl. Suddenly, his thousand watt smile came back. "Oh, well, I'll just become the Hokage and make sure that they finally see me for who I am!"

With this statement, the face of the entrapped Kage sprung into an identical smile.

"Well, since you are technically a clone of me, you'll instinctively know all of my jutsus. How about I teach you a few of 'em; since you probably won't awaken for a week or so."

"Yosh, all right, let's do this!"

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

The group returning to Konoha had stopped only long enough for Jiraiya to burn the bodies of the fallen enemies. Using a large amount of chakra and soldier pills, the group made it back to the village in a day, as compared to the day and three-quarters that it took them to arrive at the cave. Tsunade was constantly checking on Naruto, who was being supported by Gaara's sand, to make sure that the re-integration of the nine-tails wasn't harming her adopted brother. Since they were just outside of the village, and no one was in any need of urgent medical attention, they took a break and rested for a while.

Around her, Tsunade heard the rest of the group was conversing about their new found knowledge. Ok, to be fair, there wasn't a lot of conversation going on, seeing as almost everyone was dumbstruck at the new developments.

Sasuke could only go over his history with the blonde shinobi who had declared himself to be the Uchiha's brother. Sure, Naruto could be an idiotic dobe, who couldn't do a bunshin to save his life, but then often times he was the one that would risk his own neck to save a member of his team or finish the mission. Images of Naruto throwing himself in front of a giant snake, saving Sasuke from being eaten in the forest of death, or Naruto driving a rasengan into the blade of the Raijin no Ken (Thunder God Sword) and breaking it, when the chidori couldn't, flashed through the mind of the surviving Uchiha. In a way, all of Naruto's actions made it seem as if he really was two different people, and now he knew why.

Meanwhile, Hinata was sitting with Tsunade and Naruto, just watching the steady rise and fall of his chest, proving that her boyfriend was alive and well. They were suddenly joined by the Kazekage.

"May I talk with you?" He asked Hinata.

"S-sure." She said. Gaara led them away from the camp.

"My brother and sister told me that you were able to destroy a cloud Nin, who was dead." Gaara said, emotionlessly.

"H-hai, I b-broke a s-s-seal on his c-che-chest." She said, trying to tame her stutter.

"You wouldn't happen to be the vessel of a demon, would you?" He asked after a moment's thought.

Hinata gasped. "How did you know?"

"I don't know, if Uzumaki Naruto told you, but I am the vessel of Shukaku, the sand demon. I thought it would be nice to get to know as many vessels as I could. What demon do you carry?" He asked.

"I am the v-vessel for the N-Nibi. S-she is a s-sw-swan demon from kumogakure." Hinata said, calming her stutter a small amount.

The two demon vessels continued to talk for a quit a while. They discussed their upbringing, and how they dealt with their respective burdens. In doing this, they discovered that they both though very highly of Naruto and both owed him much for helping to change their lives.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

When the group returned to Konoha, Tsunade and Jiraiya quickly took Naruto to the hospital, so that he could continue to absorb the chakra of the Kyuubi where they could help him if anything went wrong. After checking on his condition, Tsunade returned to her office to check on Shizune, who she had left in charge while she was away. When she walked into her office, she was greeted by both of her apprentices, who were awaiting her arrival.

"Tsunade-sensei, where were you?" Sakura asked.

"I had an urgent mission, Sakura." Tsunade said.

"Oh, what was it about?" The floral headed girl asked.

"Sakura, what I say is not to leave this room, until I am ready to break the news to all of the shinobi in the village. Do I make my self clear?"

"Hai, what happened, why is it a secret?" Sakura asked.

"A joint operation consisting of Myself, Jiraiya, Kakashi, Gai, Uchiha Sasuke, Aburame Shino, Rock Lee, Hyuuga Hinata, Nara Shikamaru, Subaka no Temari, Subaka no Kankuro, and the Kazekage went on an S-Class mission to rescue Naruto and destroy the Akatsuki." The Hokage explained.

This elicited a gasp of fright from Sakura.

"Is everyone ok, what happened?" She asked in a frantic manner.

"The Akatsuki abducted Naruto for reasons that I won't tell you about right now, and we were forced to rescue him. The organization was made up of S-Class criminals, hence why such high class shinobi of our own were needed." Tsunade explained. "Everyone is fine, except for Naruto, who is sleeping due to chakra exhaustion."

Sakura bowed and exited the room to go check on her comrade.

"What really happened, Tsunade-sama?" Shizune asked.

The Hokage just smile and said.

"You won't believe it, even after you hear it." She then proceeded to tell the complete story to Shizune, who took notes for a mission report.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

One week later, Kakashi, Hinata, and Sasuke were sitting in Naruto's room, waiting for the blonde loud mouth to awaken. Sakura had come in earlier, but due to her duty as a medic Nin, she had to leave to check on her other patients.

Shortly after noon, Naruto's eyes began to twitch and fluttered open. Upon seeing her boyfriend conscious for the first time in nearly two weeks, Hinata immediately pulled the groggy teenager into a hug.

"Good to see you're awake, Naruto." Kakashi said, in a lazy drawl.

Naruto made to answer his chronically late sensei, but no words came out.

"Here, drink some water." Sasuke said, as he handed his teammate/brother/best friend a glass of water, which Naruto quickly downed.

"Hey, what happened, why am I in the hospital, the last thing I remember was being blasted in the face by an exploding note." Naruto asked in mild confusion. "Then, something happened to the stupid fox, and the next thing I remember, I'm talking with the Yondaime of all people. What happened?"

Quickly, Hinata and Sasuke launched into the tale of his abduction and the Kyuubi's extraction and eventual rescue. When they asked about what the Yondaime had said, Naruto told them of the mental training he had done with his 'dad'.

Finally taking note of his surroundings, Naruto noticed that there were a large number of gifts from his friends. Flowers from Ino, ramen from Chouji and Shikamaru, a card from the members of team eight that didn't go with them, as well as Ten-ten and Neji. When Tsunade and Sakura heard that Naruto had awoken, they rushed into his room to check on him and make sure everything had turned out all right.

"Baa-chan! Sakura-chan!"

"NARUTO! What have I said about calling me that!" Tsunade growled.

"I'm glad to see your awake again Naruto, but how did you get captured in the first place?" Sakura asked.

"They put an exploding note on my door." Naruto pouted at his method of abduction.

The rest of the day was spent recounting the exploits of the rescue team, while glossing over the fact that Naruto was a shadow clone of the fourth Hokage, or that the Kyuubi was sealed into him… twice. The sun sank lower into the sky, until around seven o'clock it disappeared completely. When Tsunade was convinced that the seal wasn't weakened or broken, she allowed Naruto to leave the hospital.

"Hey, baa-chan, where am I going to live? I can't go back to the apartment if there isn't a land lord, can I?" The blonde shinobi asked.

"He can spend the night with me, Hokage-sama." Sasuke replied.

"Really? Thanks Sasuke!" Gushed Naruto.

"All right, tonight you can stay with Sasuke, but tomorrow, you'll have to look for a new apartment, I had all of your belongings transferred into a personal storage container in my name, so you don't have to worry about them." The Hokage said.

"Ok, um, can I ask you for a favor?" Naruto said, in a suddenly serious tone.

"That would depend on what this _favor_ is." Tsunade said.

"Well, I figured that since most of my friends know about the Kyuubi I might as well let the others know as well, so I was hoping you could call them into your office or something so I could tell them." Naruto said.

"All right, I can do that. What time would work for you?" She asked.

"Pretty much whenever, is fine, but might as well make it before lunch, so I can still go house hunting." Naruto explained.

With that, Naruto, Hinata, and Sasuke left the hospital and headed towards the Hyuuga compound to drop of Hinata. At the gate, Naruto said a quick good night to Hinata and returned her previous kiss, this time leaving her the one rooted to the ground.

"Good night, Hinata-chan, I'll see you tomorrow!" Naruto called out.

Hinata simply waved her good bye before heading inside. When Naruto and Sasuke arrived at his apartment, Naruto was impressed by how clean it was.

"I never would have picked you as the compulsive cleaning type, Sasuke." The blonde joked.

Sasuke simply shrugged his shoulders and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like 'dobe' before showing Naruto around. The two friends ate dinner and talked about different things well into the night before they split off and went to sleep.

'Maybe tomorrow, I can finally start a new life.' Naruto thought before sleep caught up with him.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Wow! Thanks for the overwhelming number of reviews for the last chapter. Please keep reviewing, while this story nears its close I have started a new one, so any advice you can give me will go to a good cause. Thank you!) **


	14. Chapter 14

The day of Naruto's revelation dawned as normal as most days. He awoke in an unfamiliar setting, before remembering that he had slept in Sasuke's apartment. He got up and headed towards the kitchen, finding Sasuke already up and eating. As Naruto sat down, Sasuke handed him a note from Tsunade.

** Naruto,**

** I set up the meeting for 10 am, so make sure you're there. **

** Tsunade**

"Hm, I bet she's sleeping when we get there." Naruto remarked to himself.

After breakfast, the two boys walked over to the Hyuuga compound to pick up Hinata. The indigo headed girl met them at 9:30, so they were in plenty of time to make it to the Hokage's office. The trio made their way up the winding stair case and into the waiting room. Since Shizune was asleep, they quietly made their way inside the office, nodding to the chunnin guards and the ANBU stationed around the office.

As expected, at least by Naruto, the Godaime was asleep on her desk, blonde hair falling over her head, protecting her from the sun's harsh rays. Naruto snickered as he thought of ways to wake the sleeping women. Neither Hinata nor Sasuke had ever seen the Hokage asleep at work, so they didn't know how to approach her. Hinata was about to walk over and shake her awake, until Naruto's hand on her shoulder stopped her forward movement.

"Not a good idea, Hinata-chan. Here watch this." Her boyfriend explained.

He quickly made a shadow clone and sent it on its mission, from which there would be no return. The clone made its way to the side of the Hokage, before it took a mighty breath and yelled:

"HIYA, BAA-CHAN!"

Before anyone could cringe from the loud noise, there was a loud 'poof' and a plume of smoke as the clone was instantly destroyed by a fist to the skull. The two new comers to this ritual cringed in fear of that clone being a human being.

"Huh, what's going on?" Came the dumb response of the Hokage. Clearing the sleep from her eyes, she noticed the three arrivals to her office.

"Oh, is it 10 all ready?" She asked.

In answer to her question, the members of the 'Rookie 9' arrived, wondering why they were summoned. Next to the Hokage, stood Naruto and Hinata, Sasuke had moved to stand with the group.

"Well, I suggest that we get this over with, since I have an apartment to hunt." Naruto said, grinning.

"You've all been assembled today, damn that sounds stupid, any way, I had you all come here because I think it's time that I get some stuff off my chest. First of all, I'd like to thank you all for being my friends or caring for me in some way, when I was younger, without you guys, I probably wouldn't be who I am today. As you are all aware, sixteen years ago, the demon fox, Kyuubi attacked our village, reeking havoc and taking the lives of many brave shinobi and civilians. The stupid fox was winning, until the Yondaime Hokage came to the battle field, on the frog-boss Gamabunta. Using a forbidden jutsu, he was able to destroy the Kyuubi, at the cost of his life. As some of you know, that is a lie, fabricated by the Sandaime. The truth is that Yondaime sealed the soul and chakra of the demon into a human vessel, so that the fox's power would eventually meld with its vessel, and its soul would transcend this earth along with the soul of its vessel. If you can't see where this is going, I am the vessel of the demon fox Kyuubi." Naruto said, his voice never wavering or faltering.

The admission shocked those in the room who didn't all ready know. While the group was collectively pondering this fact, the thought once again occurred to Sakura that she didn't know her team mates at all. Actually, the thought was running through the minds of all of those present.

For the longest time, no one said anything, making Naruto nervous, He was afraid that they would abandon him, although this time, he would at least have friends.

"W-why didn't you tell us earlier?" Ino asked, confusion lacing her voice.

"Well, I guess it was because I didn't know until I was twelve, when Mizuki told me, then I was afraid that you would all abandon me if you found out. There was also the law that the Sandaime put into effect to make sure that I would have a fair chance to make friends my age." Naruto explained.

"Why would it matter if kids didn't know?" Tenten asked.

"Because, despite the Yondaime's wish for Naruto to be treated as a hero, the village has never seen him in that light, people despise him and blame him for their losses. For these people, time hasn't healed any wound, it has simply rubbed salt into them." Neji explained. As the only jounin in the group, he had become aware of Naruto's predicament.

"You mean that people blame Naruto for what the Kyuubi did to the village?" Sakura asked, in obvious disbelief. Looking at the occupants of the room, she saw a sea of bobbing heads, Shino, Sasuke, Lee, Hinata, and the Hokage were all nodding their head in confirmation.

This caused both Ino and Sakura to become angry at the ignorance of the village.

"Now, I have something else I'd like to say." Naruto brought the group back to attention. "To seal a being as powerful as the Kyuubi, the vessel must have chakra coils that haven't solidified yet. Therefore, the vessel must be a new born baby. Unfortunately there wasn't a baby that the Yondaime could use. He didn't have one of his own, and he couldn't simply ask for someone to donate their child, so he had to…improvise. If any of you noticed, I share a remarkable resemblance to the Yondaime. Some of you may have believed that I am his son, but truthfully I am a very advanced shadow clone."

This made the group that hadn't gone on the rescue mission gasp in shock and surprise.

"What do you mean a shadow clone?" Neji asked.

"During the fight with the Kyuubi, the Yondaime had to find a child who had recently been born. He assumed that whichever child he chose would be wanted for the power of the Kyuubi, and wanted the child to be from an established shinobi family. Since he couldn't find a baby fitting those specifications, he used a kinjutsu, kage bunshin: sozo to create life from nothing. Naruto is a true clone of the Yondaime, who knows every technique ever used by the Yondaime." Tsunade explained.

The majority of the room was contemplating this new bit of information. If Naruto was indeed a clone of the Yondaime, than he knew all of the Yondaime's attacks and when you add that to the chakra and power of the Kyuubi…damn.

Tsunade then went on to relate the tale of the rescue mission and the subsequent downfall of the Akatsuki and Orochimaru. The group was awestruck that the Yondaime had possessed Naruto in order to kill Orochimaru. When the story telling was done, everyone just stood or sat in the office of the Hokage for a while, in a state of shock. Almost every major enemy of their village was dead, and all in the space of two months.

People started to file out around twelve thirty for lunch, every one assuring Naruto that they still viewed him as their friend and not as a demon. These assurances brought Naruto a newfound joy in his life. He would always have friends who would stick by him, despite being the vessel for the demon fox.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Five months had passed since the fall of Orochimaru and Otogakure along with the total destruction of the criminal organization Akatsuki. Spring had brought a newfound life to the village of Konoha and with it renewed trade with Suna. The Jounin exams had been held in late January. Almost every one of the chunnin nine had participated, with the exception of Ino, Shikamaru, and Sasuke. Ino had been accepted as the protégé of Morino Ibiki, the torture specialist. She was expanding her family's jutsu to help in the interrogation of enemy ninja. She was perfectly happy to remain a chunnin, at least for the time being. Shikamaru had never wanted to become a jounin and didn't need to, if he wanted to become the strategist of the village. Sasuke's suspension had been lifted shortly after the rescue mission returned, but he still needed to pass the chunnin exam. He had already received offers to join both the hunter Nins as well as ANBU, and was considering both, leaning towards the ANBU option.

The test consisted of only two parts. The first was a tournament, much like the chunnin exams, but instead of limiting the field to ten, the field was cut to twenty. The second part was an A-class mission, to be completed in teams of five. All of the chunnin's who had graduated with Naruto passed the first part of the exam, except for Kiba, who had the unfortunate luck to face Rock Lee, and Chouji who fought an experienced chunnin to a draw.

The group of twenty was divided into four teams for the second part and given their mission. Naruto had the great luck to find himself on the same team as Shino, Hinata, and two more experienced chunnin, including the replacement for Mizuki at the academy. Their mission was a fairly straight forward retrieval mission. A scroll from Kirigakure, containing a schematic of the village's defense had been stolen by a missing ninja, and was being auctioned off on the black market to Iwagakure. The only real reason that this was considered an A-class mission and not a B-class was the involvement of stone-ninja, who still harbored grudges against Konoha from the third great Ninja Wars.

The group had made it to the small outpost where the exchange was supposed to take place, and waited for the nuke-nin to arrive. When he did, Shino quickly attached his kikai bugs to the ninja, preventing him from using jutsu, and the two older chunnin moved in to take possession of the information.

After dispatching of the missing Nin, the group made a quick retreat towards Konoha. Shino was using his bugs to scout in front of the group, and Hinata's byakugan was covering the rear. About midway between the village and the meeting place, Hinata signaled that they were being tracked by Iwa ninja. There were only three of them, but they were al jounin. It would be best to avoid them and return to the village. Naruto simply made a large number of shadow clones as a distraction, and the group left a number of traps to ward off the following ninja.

In the end, the mission was a success, although, only Shino and Naruto were promoted. The other two chunnin were told that they weren't quite ready for the missions they would take as jounin, and Hinata was offered an apprenticeship with the hospital, to further her medical studies.

Naruto made his way towards the Hyuuga compound to pick up Hinata for a date. The warm sun was beginning to lower in the western sky as he knocked on the door. Moments later Hinata appeared and the two headed off towards a nice restaurant on the edge of the village. It was a nice meal and the pair discussed the different things they were doing in their new jobs.

"I'm starting to do basic surgeries." Hinata explained. "Nothing too big, mostly just small bone fragments in non-vital spots on the body. The most difficult one I've had to do was an appendectomy."

"Yeah, how did that go?" The blonde asked.

"It was routine, so no major problems, it wasn't even an emergency removal, and it was just a precaution." The Hyuuga heiress explained.

"That's great, Hinata-chan, I kinda wish I had cool stuff like that to do." Naruto whined. "But I can't complain too much, the missions I've been getting have been interesting at least. I got to go back to Wave Country and visit Inari and his family. They had requested some help with some Grass ninja that were encroaching on the village."

The remainder of dinner was eaten quickly and soon the pair was walking around Konoha. During the course of their relationship, they had gotten into a habit of going out for a meal and then walking around, simply discussing whatever happened to be on their minds at the time, until Hinata had to return to her home. Tonight's topic of conversation was brought up by Hinata.

"Um…Naruto-kun, th-there's something I want to talk with you about." The young women said, reverting to her shy nature. "Well, the council, um, they want me to get married by December…"

At this point in her speech, Naruto interrupted her.

"I know, Hinata-chan, your father explained the deal to me a while ago, I was waiting for you to bring it up so we could discuss it. I want to know how you feel about it." He asked.

For a moment Hinata didn't respond, simply staring at the ground, finding something fascinating hidden among the pebbles and dirt.

"Naruto-kun…I…I don't mind the proposal of the clan, I don't, I just didn't know how you would react." She explained.

"I don't mind it at all, Hinata-chan, I love you and I doubt that I'll ever stop loving you. I'm more worried about how everyone would take it, if we got engaged. You know, the whole 'noble clan heiress and the demon' thing." He smiled at the last part, unable to keep a straight face.

"I think that the village should keep out of my life, as well as the clan." She stated firmly.

"You know," Naruto said in a mock serious tone of voice "when I become the Hokage, you'll be pulled even more into the village life." He mocked her.

This caused the formerly shy girl to giggle at her boyfriend's antics.

"Hinata-chan, I've got a question for you." Said Naruto as he interrupted her fit of laughter. "When your Dad told me about the agreement, he said that…well he said that you would have asked me to marry you if you weren't so shy. Is that true?"

Hinata blushed a brilliant shade of crimson, but stared directly into Naruto's eyes as she answered.

"Hai, Naruto-kun, I've been in love with you since the academy, and I don't think I could imagine marrying anyone but you."

For a moment, there was a pause in dialogue between the two. It was Naruto who broke the silence after a minute.

"Well, then Hyuuga Hinata, would you marry me? You know, when we get older and are ready for it." He asked, he suddenly felt as if his stomach was going to tie it's self into a knot and squeeze until it broke in half.

Hinata simply stared at her boyfriend reading his emotions as if they were a book. He was nervous which showed that he really was sincere on his offer. Fighting back the tears that began to well up in the corners of her eyes, Hinata grabbed Naruto in what would be described as a bone crushing hug. She quickly lost her battle against her tears and began to cry on his shoulder, whispering the words:

"Yes, yes Naruto-kun, I'll marry you!"

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: I'm sorry to say that this fic has reached its end. There is only one more chapter remaining, and it's going to be an epilogue, set after a time skip. I'd say five or more years. Anyway, I'd like to thank everyone who's read this story, and especially everyone who's reviewed it. Right now most of my time is being invested into my other story, but I could be persuaded to make a sequel to the story, just let me know what you think. Thanks!)**


	15. Chapter 15

Seven years had passes in Konoha, since the return of and eventual marriage of Uzumaki Naruto and Hyuuga Hinata. They had both progressed throughout the ninja ranks rapidly; Naruto had accomplished more missions in his first year than any other jounin in the history of the village. Hinata had proven herself to be an accomplished medic and clan leader. Under her reign the Hyuuga clan had reformed itself, there was no longer the hideous division between main and branch families, and the use of the caged-bird seal was outlawed.

It had taken him over eighteen years, but Uzumaki Naruto had achieved recognition from the village. He wasn't Hokage…yet…but everyone said it was only a matter of time before the blonde man would become the next leader of the leaf village. He had proven himself more than trustworthy to the other ninja on many different missions, ranging from assassination, to retrieval, to guard duty. When war threatened to engulf the ninja world, Naruto had played a role in solidifying peace. The Stone village had gained the 'official' record, claiming Naruto to be the Yondaime's son, and quickly backed down from war. The Mist village also stopped their efforts upon hearing of the news, and Sunagakure had never been a threat to start war, Gaara proving to be one of the strongest Kazekage's in the village's history.

As noted by many different people throughout the history of Konoha, the 'Rookie 9' had indeed grown to become some of the most accomplished ninja in the history of the village. Uchiha Sasuke was an ANBU captain, and leading candidate to eventually take over the Special Forces. His only real competition came from Hyuuga Neji, who had amassed an impressive record in terms of missions.

Chouji had decided that he was happy teaching at the academy along with Tenten, who had become engaged to Neji only recently.

Shikamaru was in ANBU as the chief strategist and was still dating Temari from Suna, saying "It's just too troublesome to get married…but don't let my girlfriend hear that I said that or she'll kill me."

The last member of the former gennin team 10, Yamanaka Ino, was now Subaka no Ino, having married the Kazekage's older brother Kankuro. They have a small two year old son who has his father's messy hair, but instead of dirty brown, he sports a shocking blonde. The pair lives in Konoha, where Ino is the chief interrogator, and Kankuro has become a private tutor.

Shino had a distinguished career in both ANBU and the Hunter Nin, before taking over has head of the Aburame clan.

Kiba has done very well, becoming the best Hunter Nin in the village, along with his partner, Akamaru.

Haruno Sakura became the head of Hospital in Konoha, following in the footsteps of her mentor and sensei, Tsunade. She is more than likely the strongest medic in the known shinobi world, and is as feared as Tsunade. She has married Rock Lee and the couple has two children, a boy and a girl who have inherited their mother's pink hair…but none of their father's hair traits. As Naruto put it upon seeing them "Thank Kami, we don't have to worry about more fuzzy-brows!" Even recovering from child birth, one of Sakura's punches still hurts. Lee has grown into a fine Jounin and instructor to his own team of gennin. Despite all attempts by his wife to change his wardrobe, he resists.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

Absolutely none of this information was floating through the mind of Uzumaki Naruto at the moment. He was walking home in a daze, occasionally bumping into people and the occasional newspaper stand. He headed towards the Hyuuga estates, where he lived with his wife of just over three years, Hinata and their two year old son, Shinta. Technically, they lived just off the compound, but it was close enough for most people to simply call it inside the jurisdiction of the Hyuuga.

Naruto walked inside to find his son playing on the floor, while Hinata was sitting on a couch watching. Shinta had inherited his mother's byakugan and dark hair, but it stuck up in all kinds of unnatural directions like his father.

Naruto strolled over to his wife and sank into the soft couch. He simply watched his son play without saying anything. He was staring at his son when he broke the silence.

"Tsunade-baa-chan's retiring, and she named me Rokudaime." He said, breaking into is infamous grin.

"That's great, you've always wanted to be Hokage, congratulations." Hinata said, kissing him.

"Yay! Daa's 'portant!" Shinta echoed from his position on the floor.

"'Course I'm important! Now how about we celebrate…at Ichiraku's!"

This got a groan from Hinata and a loud "Yeah!" From Shinta.

I guess things haven't changed that much in 7 years.

**AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA**

**(A/N: Well, that does it, I am officially done with this story. Now I can concentrate on my other one and not fear for my sanity. You have no idea how hard it is to juggle multiple plot lines, Calculus, Biology, and Charles Dickens at the same time. Not to mention, I've been listening to 'Rooftops' by Lostprophets for the last twelve hours straight. It's an awesome song, anyway, I'd like to thank everyone who has read this story, and especially those who have reviewed it, thanks a bunch. Nightblade888)**


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